Far-right candidates hit snag in France

French hard-right presidential candidates Eric Zemmour and Marine Le Pen are struggling to gather the minimum number of nominations needed to qualify for the April vote.

Le Pen, who represents the National Rally party, or RN, put her campaign on hold on Tuesday as local officials have been reluctant to pledge the required support for her to stand, reported the Agence France-Presse.

French election rules dictate that candidates are required to gather 500 sponsorship letters from local mayors or members of Parliament in order to qualify for the ballot list, said the AFP.

Le Pen has managed to secure just 393 such pledges, while her challenger on the right Zemmour, of the newly formed Reconquete party, has only 350, said Euronews. Hard-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon is also reported to be struggling on 442.

This is the first time that the nominations are being made public after the rules were changed in 2016 under former president Francois Hollande. Le Pen and Zemmour have both called for this reform policy to be overturned.

Even though the two have been polling in second and third place behind incumbent President Emmanuel Macron, local officials are said to have been cautious to publicly declare who they are nominating, fearing a public backlash for endorsing more extreme candidates, reported The Daily Telegraph.

The newspaper said some officials expressed concern that they could be branded as "racist" for backing certain candidates, while others have misgivings that local financial support could be frozen if they nominated the "wrong" contender.

Under pressure

Earlier this week, AFP quoted a spokesperson for Le Pen saying that officials were under "a lot of pressure" from departmental councils and communities of municipalities.

"The lifting of anonymity is terrible for democracy," said member of European Parliament Jean-Lin Lacapelle.

Reuters said the latest opinion polls show Macron ahead with 25 percent for the first round of voting on April 10. Le Pen and Zemmour are competing for second place with 16 percent each. The agency added that the polling shows Macron would win a second round runoff against all candidates.

Time is short for candidates seeking to collect the signatures needed from any of 42,000 elected officials, AFP reported. The cut off point for ballot qualification is March 4.

Le Pen made a social media plea to officials to give her the backing she requires.

"If you don't help me, millions of voters will be deprived of an election," she said on Twitter.

Euronews said only six candidates have received the required 500 pledges to date: Valerie Pecresse of the right-wing Les Republicains, the Socialist Party's Anne Hidalgo, the Greens' Yannick Jadot, the Communist Party's Fabien Roussel, centrist Jean Lasalle and Macron.