French press review 12 December 2015

A daring robbery near the gates of the Elysée send French press giggling about security under the state of emergency declared in France in the aftermath of the Paris attacks; Prime Minister Manuel Valls under fire for fear-mongering on eve of regional elections; And Michel Platini's bid for FIFA's presidency appears doomed after sports court of arbitation shuts him out of EURO 2016 draws.

DR

Le Monde reports from the new bastions of the Front National, the Nord-Pas-de-Calais-Picardie where the party's leader Marine Le Pen is standing.

Florian Phillipot's stronghold in Alsace-Champagne-Ardenne-Lorraine and particlarly the southern French Riviera PACA region where the youthful Marion Marechal Le Pen is looking to cause one of the great earthquakes of her party's eruption into France's largest political party. Under scrutiny are the 92 campaign proposals.

Le Monde says she will not be able to deliver the entire political manifesto she intends to implement as key issues hinge instead on the government and not on the region. Only 43 are applicable says the paper while eight measures are already in place, 12 unverifiable, three impossible to apply and 26 very difficult to implement.

Le Figaro scorns the ruling Socialist party for the hysteria it has brought to the end of the election campaign, notably Prime Minister Manuel Vall's references to a looming spectre of civil war.

According to the conservative publication, the Prime Minister is piling fear on fear when he accuses the Front National of racism and anti-Semitism and also of fueling divisions and stigmatizing some segments of the the population.

Le Figaro jumps on its feet to denounce Friday's daring robbery in probably the most highly secured neighbourhoods of Paris, within walking distance from the Elysée Palace government.

The paper says that a criminal said to be in his fifties, walked into a luxury jewel shop, pointed a gun at the jeweller and stole jewels estimated to be worth a million euros. Le Figaro explains that there were neither gun shots fired nor any rough handling of the jeweller, citing sources close to the preliminary investigations.

Le Parisien is betting on a citizens' surge as it looks forward to Sunday's second round of the key French regional elections. But the newspaper's front page splash is about the bleak furture facing French football icon Michel Platini.

This is after the court of arbitration for sports upheld the 90-day ban from all football activities over the 1.8 million euro payment he received from suspended FIFA chief Sepp Blatter. Friday's ruling means that Platini will miss Friday's draw in Paris of the 2016 EURO tournament scheduled in France.

Le Parisien has a photograph of Platini swarmed by newsmen as he emerged from a hearing at the court of arbitration on Friday.

The caption is a shocking quote by a FIFA ethics committee spokesman who told sports daily L'Equipe that Platini will be suspended from football for several years, meaning that even before he faces the board in Zurich on December 18, his prospects of standing in the race to succeed disgraced FIFA President Sepp Blatter are doomed.

Platini's woes are looking like a disaster for France with Le Monde posting a comment about FIFA's unwillingness to use a stop watch or allow the Platini match to extend into injury time.