Conservative presidential frontrunner Francois Fillon drew cheers for his uncompromising views on Islam and French identity at a final rally in Paris Friday ahead of a primary vote this weekend to choose the Republicans party candidate.
Fillon's surge has taken commentators and pollsters by surprise and he will go head-to-head with his centrist rival Alain Juppe in Sunday's vote when millions will pick the party's candidate for next year's presidential election.
Speaking in front of a flag-waving crowd of thousands, Fillon drew applause for his plans for radical economic reform and cheers when he strayed onto questions of French identity and Islam.
Having dismissed multiculturalism and called for patriotism to heal France's divisions, he demanded that "the Islamic religion accept what all the others have accepted in the past... that radicalism and provocation have no place here."
Juppe has sought to portray 62-year-old Fillon, also an ex-prime minister, as having a "brutal" economic programme as well as positions on identity and religion that appeal to people on the far-right.
"I'm confident of victory on Sunday," the more moderate Juppe told a crowd in Nancy despite polls forecasting a comfortable win for his opponent.
Both men are positioning themselves against their expected rivals in next year's election, notably the resurgent far-right leader Marine Le Pen, as well as a Socialist party candidate and independents.
Juppe has made a clear pitch for the centre ground, promising a "happy identity" for demoralised France and stressing that the country's strength must come from its diversity.
"I think I am best placed with my programme to beat Marine Le Pen," Juppe said on Friday, referring to the nationalist and anti-immigration boss of the National Front.
Fillon has accused Juppe of lacking reformist zeal and he invoked past French legends from Charles de Gaulle to Joan of Arc on Friday.
"Was it caution that we admire in these people?" Fillon asked the crowd.
- Fillon seen ahead -
Fillon scored a surprise victory in the first round of the Republicans primary last weekend, winning 44 percent of the vote, and he gave an assured performance in a final televised debate with Juppe on Thursday night.
Fifty-seven percent of viewers judged Fillon to have been the most convincing, according to an independent poll for the BFMTV television channel of 908 people who followed the nearly two-hour exchange.
The devout Catholic wants to slash 500,000 public sector jobs over five years and scrap the 35-hour working week in a bid to kick-start the sluggish economy.
While Juppe appeared to struggle during Thursday's debate, he hit home with a jibe at Fillon's closeness to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"This must be the first presidential election in which the Russian president chooses his candidate," Juppe said, referring to praise by Putin for Fillon on Wednesday.
Fillon believes the European Union and the United States "provoked" Russia by expanding in eastern Europe.
He also criticised what he called the "absurd" policy of Socialist President Francois Hollande, who has confronted Putin over the 2014 annexation of Crimea and alleged war crimes by Russian forces in Syria.
- Battle with far-right -
Le Pen is currently forecast to come first or second in the first round of the election on April 23 with around 30 percent of the vote, but then fail in the run-off on May 7.
But following the wave of populism that led British voters to choose to leave the European Union and swept Donald Trump to victory in the United States, no one is writing off the National Front leader's chances.
Le Pen says she wants to ditch the euro and organise a referendum on France's EU membership -- a move that would put the future of European integration at stake.
There was bad news for Hollande's prospects of seeking re-election when an opinion poll Friday showed more than twice as many people would prefer Prime Minister Manuel Valls to be the Socialist presidential candidate over him.
Valls, the combative Spanish-born premier, got the support of 65 percent of respondents to the Harris Interactive poll compared to just 23 percent for Hollande.
Hollande has said he will decide before the end of the year whether to stand again.
