“WE HAVE nothing to hide...I am afraid of nothing!” With indignant words and a clenched fist, François Fillon put on a muscular display of defiance at a campaign rally in Paris this week. Before a crowd of 15,000 flag-waving, mostly grey-haired supporters, the centre-right presidential candidate promised to make France the “greatest European power” within ten years, to put “liberty” at the heart of his campaign, and to declare a war on both poverty and “radical Islam”. The event pointed to unity as well as force: Alain Juppé, the Republican primary candidate defeated by Mr Fillon, applauded his rival from the front row. But the choreography could not conceal an awkward fact: Mr Fillon’s candidacy is in real trouble.
Just days previously, the former prime minister had been the favourite to win the two-round French presidential election in April and May. But the decision on January 25th by judicial investigators to launch a preliminary inquiry into misuse of public funds by Mr Fillon, after revelations in a newspaper, shocked many of his supporters. His, after all, was the candidacy of probity and honour. One cannot lead France, he declared during the Republicans’ primary last year, unless one is “beyond reproach”. It turned out that Mr Fillon had employed his wife, Penelope, possibly from as far back as 1988, for a total pre-tax sum of over €800,000 ($863,000), as well as two of his children when they were law students. This is not illegal; some 20% of French deputies employ a family member. But the newspaper could find no trace that Ms Fillon had done any work.
Declaring himself “scandalised” by the “misogyny” behind the allegations, and the victim of “slander”, Mr Fillon argued that his wife had done a real job, “correcting speeches”, constituency work and so forth. Investigators are also looking into pay she received from a publication for which she appeared to write little. It was all highly suspicious, declared an indignant Mr Fillon, that such slurs should emerge only months before an election. Investigators this week summoned the couple for questioning, and searched Mr Fillon’s parliamentary office. In a bid to show that he had nothing to hide, the candidate said he would stand down if he is put under formal investigation.
“Penelopegate” has rudely shaken the Fillon camp. His lieutenants have been dispatched to the airwaves to defend their candidate. His team is preparing to face down fresh allegations as they arise. But in private those close to him recognise that Mr Fillon has a big problem. Polls are beginning to show him neck-and-neck with Emmanuel Macron, an independent centre-left candidate who is capturing cross-party enthusiasm. One poll this week even shows Mr Macron ahead. Some are beginning to think through what would happen if Mr Fillon had to step down. Mr Juppé, the runner-up, has ruled out taking his place, but might be persuadable. Nicolas Sarkozy, the former president, would lack credibility after being roundly beaten in the primary. The party has no procedure for selecting a substitute.
The next few weeks will be decisive. For now, Mr Fillon remains defiant. “His image has been affected, but not yet his core support,” says Bruno Jeanbart, of OpinionWay, a polling group. Out in the draughty exhibition hall by the Paris ring road which served as a venue for Mr Fillon’s rally, his supporters were divided. The faithful, including retired folk from northern France who had travelled to Paris for the day by coach, insisted it was all a political slur. Others were torn. “I was taken aback, because I didn’t expect it from him,” said Sylvianne Bessière, a retired air hostess: “But he’s got the best programme, and is the only one who can sort the country out.” The allegations were “disappointing”, agreed a 35-year-old history teacher, but not fatal.
Mr Fillon’s difficulties have turned an already-uncertain election into one of the most unpredictable in recent history. The French, it seems, are in no mood to vote in line with any pre-written script. Only seven points now separate the leading three candidates in first-round voting: Marine Le Pen of the populist Front National (27%), Mr Macron (23%) and Mr Fillon (20%). Each has a chance of making it into the second round. This in itself is extraordinary: just six months ago, neither Mr Fillon nor Mr Macron was considered by his own camp to be a credible contender.
Such fluidity suggests that caution is also in order when it comes to the left, which elected Benoît Hamon as the Socialist Party candidate on January 29th. A former backbench rebel, he crushed Manuel Valls, his former boss and ex-prime minister, in the primary run-off, with 59% of the vote. Mr Hamon remains an outsider, drawing roughly 15% in national polls. His promises to shorten the working week to 32 hours, legalise cannabis and finance a universal monthly income of €750 through a tax on robots were dismissed by his detractors—including Mr Valls—as Utopian reverie. Despondent Socialists have begun to defect to Mr Macron. Yet Mr Hamon’s unexpected victory gives him that elusive political quality, momentum. And he speaks to metropolitan, white-collar voters who are worried about green issues, consumerism and the future of work.
Internal divisions and doubts about their candidates are now testing the unity of both the Socialists and the Republicans. These are the political families that have alternated in the presidency since the Fifth Republic was founded in 1958. French party politics has seldom appeared so unstable. And the chief beneficiaries right now are those who have identified themselves as political insurgents against the established party system: Mr Macron, and the populist Ms Le Pen.