Sarkozy knocked out of race

The surprise winner of the first round of France's rightwing presidential primary, conservative ex-premier Francois Fillon, was the runaway favourite to win the contest expected to decide France's next leader.

Fillon, an admirer of Margaret Thatcher who has pledged deep economic reforms, pulled off a stunning upset Sunday, surging from behind to knock his former boss Nicolas Sarkozy out of the race and beat the longtime favourite, Alain Juppe, into distant second.

Fillon and Juppe, also a former prime minister, will go head-to-head in a run-off on Sunday, with the winner expected to meet far-right leader Marine Le Pen in the second round of the presidential election in May.

As Fillon faced immediate attacks from the left as "an ultra-conservative", former centre-right prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin also warned that his programme of cuts was "unworkable."

"There is no chance of implementing reforms through brute force," Raffarin, an ally of Juppe, told BFM television on Monday morning.

Polls show Le Pen being beaten at the final hurdle but her rivals have warned that all bets are off in a country where anti-elite sentiment that propelled Donald Trump to the White House is also running high.

Sarkozy's defeat at the hands of his former premier Fillon, a man he once nicknamed "Mr Nobody", marked what appeared to be an ignominious end to the ex-president's forty years in politics.

His hard-right campaign and failure to enact many of his promises when in power from 2007-2012 repelled many voters in his camp.

Conceding defeat for the second time in four years, an unusually humble Sarkozy said it had not been easy for his family to live with a man who "arouses so many strong feelings".

"It is time for me to begin a life with less public and more private passions," he said, endorsing Fillon in the second round.