President Nicolas Sarkozy pledged to achieve a budget surplus for the first time since 1974 and cut France's swelling debt if re-elected on May 6, warning that his Socialist rival would lead the country towards the fate of Greece or Spain.
Presenting an austere manifesto less than three weeks before the first round of voting on April 22, Sarkozy said he would put a "golden rule" to parliament in July committing France to balance its budget as promised to its European partners.
"Some countries in Europe are on the edge of a precipice today. We cannot refuse to make the historic choice of competitiveness, innovation and reducing public spending," said the conservative incumbent, who trails Socialist Francois Hollande in all polls for the decisive run-off.
"To depart even slightly from the commitments France has made would mean a crisis of confidence," he said, adding that recent events had shown that countries could go bankrupt and face mass unemployment.
Sarkozy, who presided over an explosion of the debt and deficit after the 2008 financial crisis, said his programme would generate a budget surplus of 0.5% of GDP in 2017 after achieving balance in 2016, and public debt would fall to 80.6% from a peak of 89.4% in 2013.
He said he was sending out a 36-page letter to the French people, setting out his promises in writing. The aim was to reconcile supporters and opponents of European integration and winners and losers of globalisation.
Sarkozy also called for a mass rally of the "silent majority" to support him on Paris' central Place de la Concorde on April 15 – a week before the first ballot.
"RETAKE THE BASTILLE"
He seemed to be trying to emulate hard-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon, who has stormed to third place in some opinion polls after leading a march of tens of thousands of leftists to "retake the Bastille" last month, symbolically re-enacting one of the high points of the 1789 French Revolution.
Hollande said he would order an audit of public finances if elected, a day after he set out his own 60-day programme of the first emergency economic measures.
The battle over debt and deficit came after a cover story in the Economist weekly entitled "France in Denial" made waves in political circles by accusing both leading candidates of lacking serious ideas for tackling the country's economic and fiscal problems.
Sarkozy said Hollande's plan to immediately lower the retirement age back to 60 from 62 for people who started work at age 18 or younger showed it was the Socialist who was in denial.
Earlier, Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, tipped as a possible prime minister if Sarkozy wins, said Hollande's economic and European plans were an "explosive cocktail" that could derail Europe's exit from its debt crisis.
He called the Socialist's plans to freeze fuel prices and boost family welfare payments short-sighted and said his plan to renegotiate a European treaty on budget discipline would inject new uncertainty into nervous financial markets.
Latest opinion polls show Sarkozy slightly ahead or level with Hollande in the first round, with Melenchon edging ahead of far-right candidate Marine Le Pen for third place and centrist Francois Bayrou loosing ground in fifth. But all show Hollande ahead with at least 53 and up to 56%, of voting intentions for the decisive second ballot.
