The room begins to boo the pollsters.

"We don't whistle, we vote!" retorts Anne Hidalgo.

“For six months, we have been told that it is already decided. Well no! Nothing is ever decided until the vote has taken place”.

She spoke in particular to voters "who have often trusted us and could say to themselves: + what's the point of voting for a party which we know in advance will be eliminated from the race in a week? +".

"You who have supported us in the past, you who basically share our values, I know you, and I respect you (...) you have left us, but you are family", he said. she says.

"You may say to yourself, why go back to a left which, in any case, would pass its turn? (...) because Macron is on the right! It's a simple and obvious reality", she said. for follow-up.

"If you have leftist ideas, if you are concerned about social issues, justice, solidarity, ecology, you must know it, Emmanuel Macron does not even calculate you!", She continued.

"Join your family of origin, the left of reality and reason, which recognizes its mistakes", she urged them.

Socialist presidential candidate Anne Hidalgo during her last campaign rally at the Cirque d'Hiver in Paris, April 3, 2022 Thomas COEX AFP

The socialist candidate also warned of "the consequences" of a vote in favor of the rebellious Jean-Luc Mélenchon, third man in the election, given around 15% in the polls: "immediately, you will vote for a candidate who refuses to help Ukrainians".

“How could a candidate who theorized the end of the left, then in the local elections fought all the rest of the left, could now represent any hope for the left?”, she asked, believing that “ Mélenchon, it's a dead end"

© 2022 AFP