France has been under spotlight as it prepares for a new presidential elections in six months.
A recent poll showed Eric Zemmour and Marine Le Pen with the backing of nearly a third of French voters.
The poll, published on October 6, predicted secure 32 percent; 17 percent for Eric Zemmour and 15 percent for Marine Le Pen.
The election takes place in April but in order to stand candidates need the backing of 500 elected representatives.
These 500 signatures, known as parrainages in French, must come from officials in at least 30 different departments, with no more than a tenth of them from one single department.
The race to gather signatures has already begun in France, with many candidates from smaller parties starting early to have a better chance of reaching the 500 target.
All candidates have until at the latest six weeks before the first round of voting. T they require the 500 names before March 16, 2022.
The current president Emmanuel Macron is the clear favourite to stand as candidate for his party La République.
Macron and Le Pen are the favourites to win in 2022. The two faced off in a second round of voting in 2017, with Macron winning decisively.
However, much of the French media is not focused on Macron’s chances of becoming the first president to be re-elected since Jacques Chirac in 2002, but rather on the rise of the far right.
