LOC13:10
10:10 GMT
PARIS, Sept 30 (KUNA) -- Some 80 percent of French voters say incumbent President Francois Hollande should not run for a second term in 2017 and 88 percent say he has failed in his promise to turn France's high unemployment around, a poll said on Friday.
The survey of almost 1,000 eligible voters also indicated that among supporters of the Socialist leader polled by "Odoxa" for "France Info Radio", 64 percent said he should not seek a second term and 74 percent of Socialist party sympathisers indicated they did not believe Hollande would positively turn unemployment around in the next six months.
Hollande has not yet said he will run again, but during this term he has said that he would not seek a second mandate if he didn't succeed in turning the unemployment trend around. He is due to make his intentions known towards the end of 2016.
The French presidential election will take place in two rounds between April and May, 2017.
France currently has over 3.5 million people out of work and an official jobless rate of just over 10 percent, but some analysts say the official figures do not represent the real situation which is much worse, with as many as five million people without full-time jobs.
The French leader has been successful a couple of times in inversing the jobless trend but only for short periods, and August saw one of the highest monthly increases in unemployment for a number of years.
Friday's poll is the worst negative rating Hollande has received since he took office in May 2012 and the survey will likely encourage Hollande's rivals in the Socialist party. (End)
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