"I am certain that the political recomposition will happen, I believe victory is possible again", launched the granddaughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen and former FN deputy (now RN) from Vaucluse, claiming "a great union in law".

After a series of criticisms, even in his camp, Eric Zemmour took advantage of this meeting to qualify his position on the Ukrainian refugees, in the midst of the Russian invasion.

He always favors their reception in Poland rather than in France, but for those who "prefer to come to France, for example because they have ties there or are French-speaking", "so they have to be welcomed until the bombings cease".

"We feel close to them because they are European, because they are Christians," he said.

Far-right presidential candidate Eric Zemmour at a rally on March 6, 2022 in Toulon CLEMENT MAHOUDEAU AFP

To applause, Eric Zemmour also pleaded to "freeze" pump prices at 1.8 euros per liter in order to "protect the French from the consequences of war".

In front of 8,000 people gathered at the Zenith, he had a long applause for the rallying of Marion Maréchal, a new episode in the fratricidal war with Marine Le Pen.

"Blonde Like a Mermaid"

After five years of absence, the 32-year-old former MP, pregnant, returned to politics with a lot of staging, blue-white-red lights and thunderous music.

"She is blonde like a mermaid, she is beautiful, she is on the right, she is a conqueror", had launched the founder of Puy-du-Fou, former Secretary of State and ex-Vendée deputy Philippe de Villiers.

She castigated Emmanuel Macron, a "dividing president" with "woke ideology", "this dangerous ideology which replays the couplet of the dominant exploiting the dominated".

Former FN MP Marion Maréchal at the meeting of far-right presidential candidate Eric Zemmour at a meeting in Toulon, March 6, 2022 CLEMENT MAHOUDEAU AFP

"Yes of course, the Marxist fable has evolved since now the capitalist boss takes on the features of the heterosexual white male while the exploited worker takes on that of the racialized minority, Muslims, LGBTQI+++", dropped the young woman, before praising "the France eldest daughter of the Church".

Eric Zemmour's entourage hopes for a "turning point" to relaunch his campaign after the complicated sequence on the war in Ukraine.

"The rallies, it is part of the story of a campaign but it hardly moves the voices", estimates for his part the pollster Frédéric Dabi, of Ifop.

And Eric Zemmour was again put in difficulty this weekend after the revelation by Le Monde and the JDD of two lunches with the influential Russian oligarch Vladimir Yakunin, in 2015 and 2016. "Simple meetings" sweeps his camp.

Previously, in a white-hot Zenith, alternating "we are at home" and Marseillaise, Senator Stéphane Ravier, defector from the RN of which he was a veteran, got angry with a France that had become "partly Algerian and foreign", criticizing in passing the "shameful anniversary of the 1962 ceasefire", the date of the official cessation of fighting in the Algerian war.

"A little stiff"

Meanwhile, 150 people gathered at the station "against fascism and against Eric Zemmour", Var-Matin reported.

At the end of the morning, in the middle of a cloud of cameras and microphones, Eric Zemmour had walked the narrow alleys of the Toulon market of Mourillon, at the foot of the buildings.

He relativized his persistent drop in the polls by considering that the studies were "very varied".

One of his future voters, Nadège Moha, appreciates "his outspokenness", despite "a little stiff ideas", when "the others are liars who bludgeon us".

Far-right presidential candidate Eric Zemmour visits a market on March 6, 2022 in Toulon CLEMENT MAHOUDEAU AFP

"Zemmour Prime Minister", launches for his part Olivier, 47, a support of Marine Le Pen.

"The problem is the competition between the two," he regrets.

Nadège Dumont, a teacher, left the market hastily because Eric Zemmour "is anguished: what he thinks of Putin, about women, his convictions for incitement to hatred".

The teacher had voted Mélenchon in 2017 but "regrets" since.

She feels "lost" and leans for abstention.

At the end of his speech, Eric Zemmour made an appointment with his supporters on March 27 for a large outdoor meeting in Paris, at the Trocadero.

© 2022 AFP