Odds on the General No one at least can be
contemplating writing The Making of the President in France. Readers should know, by now of the General's decision. Writing before his broadcast I find myself won- dering most when it was he made up his mind. Once I was convinced that he would not stand: the leaked rumours a few weeks ago that he would even seemed to confirm this: he could have been shielding Georges Pompidou from the exposure of a lengthy campaign. But by the be- ginning of November it seems very rash to risk throwing his protégé on the electorate with only a month to go, The General has made himself king; it is harder to make a king of someone else.
But I still think that throughout the summer and early autumn he kept an open mind. Now he has achieved his purpose in bringing out so many candidates against him. The centre MRP for instance could hardly avoid putting someone up and M. Lecanuet is an able man, yet it is doubt- ful if he will carry even the votes of his own party. Many of the MRP votes will go to ,the General while the more radical members will choose M. Mitterand, who has the support of the Communists, When Gaston Defferre stood down, it seemed the contest might be between de Gaulle and the abstentions. The entrance of so many candidates means that it is between the Fourth and Fifth Republics. The Fifth will win, but one would have preferred it to win on the abstentions, not the divisions of the parties.
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