Carla Bruni-Sarkozy indicates Nicolas Sarkozy will seek presidential re-election Elysée sources suggest Mr Sarkozy intends to throw down the gauntlet at the last possible moment - five or six weeks before the first round on April 22. His aides say he wants to emulate François Mitterrand, the late former Socialist president, who remained above the electoral fray until just one month before the first round in 1988, going on to win a second term. " (His status) is an advantage as he remains the President while the other candidates are the challengers," political expert Dominique Reynié told Le Parisien. Mr Sarkozy is seeking to portray himself as a safe pair of hands in tackling the eurocrisis compared to the relatively inexperienced Socialist rival and front-runner, François Hollande. The notoriously frenetic leader hopes to retain momentum with a flurry of new reforms, from education to a value-added tax hike on imported goods and a levy on financial transactions. " (The reforms) act as ice breakers in the pack ice of his unpopularity," said respected political commentator Alain Duhamel. The tactic appears to have helped him catch up with Mr Hollande, whom one poll suggests he now trails by just two percentage points in voting intentions. The jovial, consensual Left-winger unveiled his campaign headquarters this week and slogan: "Change is now" but has been so far woefully short on policy details. Mr Sarkozy's camp has been brutally effective in sniping at the few proposals Mr Hollande has made, even if the Socialist is still predicted to win the second round run-off on May 6. But the president's greatest immediate threat is the rise of Miss Le Pen. An IFOP poll released on Friday put the National Front leader in striking distance of Mr Sarkozy with 21.5 per cent of the vote compared to his 23.5 per cent, raising the possibility she could knock him out to reach the two-candidate second round. The poll followed a survey in Le Monde this week showed that almost a third of voters agreed with the ideas of the National Front. Miss Le Pen has successfully rebranded her party as a French version of UKIP that wants to bring back the franc and slash immigration while debatably toning down its xenophobia. Yesterday, however, she lashed out at Qatar for investing in "Muslim" areas of French cities and for taking over Paris Saint-Germain football club. We are letting a foreign country choose its investments with regard to the religion of this or that part of the French population or of French territory. Her party, which preaches "national preference," faced embarrassment yesterday after it emerged that a man made "homeless" by Mr Sarkozy's policies featured on party posters was actually a US model. Another photo used Miss Le Pen's party of a derelict factory - to denounce Mr Sarkozy's industrial strategy - turned out to be a picture of a building in the Northern Irish town of Lurgan. But Miss Le Pen's hand will likely be further strengthened by reports yesterday that France is about to lose its coveted triple A credit status from the Standard & Poors rating agency. Mr Sarkozy has tied his fate to that of the eurozone and with 100 days to go before the first round, the future of the single currency and the French presidency remains unclear.