French papers warn of a crisis in the conservative opposition Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) after a "grotesque" leadership contest failed to produce a clear winner amid claims of vote-rigging.
But rumors of a comeback have intensified since the UMP's confused attempt to elect a successor last November, in which both candidates Francois Fillon and Jean-Francois Cope claimed victory amid intraparty squabbling and allegations of vote-rigging.
The right-wing Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) - the party of former President Nicolas Sarkozy - is defending an absolute majority in the current National Assembly.
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In Mr Sarkozy, by contrast, the beleaguered UMP possesses a figure who may just have the guts and the gusto to give some momentum to its reforms.
In practical terms, this means Mr Cope's supporters will lose crucial public funding at a time when the UMP is beset by debt, because the breakaway group will take some of the funding with them.
After Tuesday's lower house vote, a group of senators filed a legal challenge with the country's Constitutional Council, according to a statement published on the UMP conservative opposition party's senate website.
"Whether we are facing an UMP candidate or a Socialist candidate, we are showing enormous surges, including in those areas where people were saying that we had no votes in reserve, " Ms Le Pen told French TV.
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Rashid Kaci - A French Muslim politician and leader of a faction within the ruling Gaullist UMP party.
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The critics point to a recent parliamentary by-election in a safe seat, which the UMP held by only the thinnest of threads.
"Open crisis in the UMP", says a front-page headline in the centre-right Figaro after Jean-Francois Cope and former Prime Minister Francois Fillon both claimed victory.
According to a French Institute of Public Opinion poll released Wednesday, 56% of the supporters of his party -- the Union for a Popular Movement, known as UMP -- prefer Sarkozy as their candidate for the 2017 presidential election.
The UMP group in parliament has tabled a bill under which any companies or organisations would be able to set rules on religious symbols or practices.
According to AFP, he was sidelined to some degree when Mr Sarkozy took office in 2007 but made good use of a largely symbolic post - head of the UMP's parliamentary delegation - to raise his profile.
Not only is Marine Le Pen's far-right National Front likely to get the 12.5% of votes needed to make it into the run-off in nearly a fifth of the 577 constituencies, but a leadership battle has broken out within the UMP.
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As a result, leftist French bloggers were mocking the UMP on Twitter on Friday with the hashtag "mafia".
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The ex-prime minister said the faction, Rally for the UMP (R-UMP), would be dissolved if a new vote was announced.
Even assuming gains for the UMP in June, Sarkozy could face a hard slog dismantling entrenched labor protections -- such as five weeks of guaranteed vacation -- that unions have fought tooth-and-nail to keep.
Both Mr Fillon and Mr Cope accepted the call to the meeting but the latter rejected a request to remove allegedly partisan members of the UMP appeals commission which is due to hear Mr Fillon's complaint.
BBC: UMP rivals Fillon and Cope called to face-to-face talks
Expect a lot of high school games where coaches ask the ump to check the bat.
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Jean-Francois Cope officially won the UMP election on Sunday but Francois Fillon demanded a recount after it emerged 1, 300 votes had been omitted.
BBC: UMP rivals Fillon and Cope called to face-to-face talks
The announcement inches Sarkozy, who heads the governing UMP party closer to the presidential palace after a high-profile political career spanning three decades.
Francois Fillon has set up his own faction of the UMP party in the French parliament, demanding a repeat of the leadership ballot within three months.
Legislative elections are scheduled for June 10 and 17, and Sarkozy's Union for a Popular Movement party, known by its French acronym UMP, needs to hold on to its majority in parliament if it wants to be sure of pushing through his plans.
Jean-Michel Servant in the Midi Libre daily says the uncertain outcome of the vote "might well lead to the explosion of the UMP - or hasten the return to business of a certain Nicolas Sarkozy".
Mr Sarkozy's UMP party has previously denied any allegations it was involved in a plot against Mr Strauss-Kahn.
UMP, it will be up to the Socialists to present a united front at a special congress due to be held in Dijon next May.
Centre-right UMP President Jean-Francois Cope said the rally would be a "test" for the president because there were "clearly millions of French people who are probably concerned by this reform".
Some on the right wonder whether Ms Lagarde could be a future candidate for first female French president, notably because she has stayed outside the conservative UMP party's vicious in-fighting.
In France, the presidential office of Nicolas Sarkozy found itself having to backtrack on a promise made by Mr Sarkozy that big-name politicians elected to the European Parliament for his UMP party would have to take their seats.
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