PARIS - The first opinion poll since a gunman shot dead four people at a Jewish school on Monday showed President Nicolas Sarkozy would narrowly beat his Socialist challenger in the first round of a presidential election next month.
Sarkozy and Francois Hollande suspended their campaigns after three children and a rabbi were shot dead at the school in Toulouse in southwest France, killings that followed the shooting of three soldiers earlier this month.A CSA poll conducted on Monday and Tuesday showed Sarkozy would win 30 percent in the first round and Hollande 28 percent, whereas the two rivals had been neck-and-neck a week ago.
Despite Sarkozy's lead in the first round, the poll showed that Hollande was still ahead by eight percentage points in a second-round run-off on May 6, unchanged from a week ago.
