FRANCE’S EU membership and immigration dominated a televised debate between the country’s five presidential candidates on Monday night.

The call by fascist National Front (FN) leader Marine Le Pen for a referendum on withdrawal from the bloc came under attack by liberal independent Emmanuel Macron and conservative Republicans party candidate Francois Fillon.

Mr Fillon said a “Frexit” would “drag the country into social and economic chaos.”

And Mr Macron claimed: “All those who said Brexit will be wonderful … ran away and hid.” Ms Le Pen retorted that she would not be “the vice-chancellor of [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel” or “the salesperson for a multinational group.

“I want to be the president of the French Republic, truly,” she said.

Mr Macron has replaced Mr Fillon as joint favourite with Ms Le Pen since the Republicans candidate was accused of giving his wife and children fake jobs as parliamentary assistants, in which they were allegedly paid for doing nothing.

The other candidates are Socialist Party leftwinger Benoit Hamon and Unsubmissive France movement leader Jean-Luc Melenchon, who has the Communist Party’s support.

Mr Melenchon butted in as Ms Le Pen was calling for more French lessons in schools, saying: “How do you learn French, dear madam? By speaking it!”

The far-right candidate also vowed to close France’s borders to immigrants, adding: “We can’t count on Greece to deal with the flow.”

She claimed that the current refugee crisis had crated an “explosive” security situation and measures were needed “to discourage immigration.”

Ms Le Pen, who expelled her father and FN founder Jean Marie Le Pen from the party two years ago in a power struggle, has pledged to ban the wearing of visible religious symbols — including the hijab and the kippah — in public.

Mr Macron accused her of using Islam “to divide society,” though also called for an “effective expulsion policy” for illegal immigrants.

Mr Fillon called for a different approach, saying: “We must close the incoming flows by using quotas set by parliament.

“This does not affect asylum-seekers but all other forms of immigration.”