By Anna Willard
PARIS (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands joined May Day demonstrations in France on Friday to demonstrate against President Nicolas Sarkozy's handling of the financial crisis.
However, French police and unions said the numbers were significantly lower than on March 19 when up to 3 million attended the largest protests since Sarkozy's election in 2007.
Unions organised nearly 300 marches to show their frustration over soaring unemployment, scandals over executive pay and plant closures that have led to a wave of "bossnappings."
Police said only 450,000 people took to the streets around France. Organisers said the figure was 1.2 million.
Turnout in May Day rallies held in many European countries was expected to rise this year because of soaring jobless figures. Protests turned violent in Turkey, Germany and Greece.
Nearly 200 workers from a Molex factory threatened with closure joined the protest in Toulouse. Workers recently detained two managers at the U.S.-owned plant in a "bossnapping" case.
"We are here to defend our jobs that the American bankers want to get rid of claiming they are not profitable," said Pierre Bellegarde, a CGT union representative from Molex.
"We have been fighting for months and will continue to fight against the planned closure which is an economic heresy."
EXECUTIVE FRUSTRATION
Unions blamed the lower turnout on the long weekend holiday and said the numbers should be compared to the crowds on May 1, 2008, which were far lower than this year.
In a sign of how far disillusionment has spread among French workers, managerial staff were among those demonstrating.
"It is absolutely not in our tradition to protest on May 1 but given the economic context in France and crisis we decided to join in," said Carole Couvert, a leader of the CFE-CGC union for executives.
The opposition Socialist party called on its members to join the protests for the first time since 2002 and the eight main unions put aside their divisions over how to respond to Sarkozy in an attempt to present a united front.
Unions want more help for seniors and youths struggling to find jobs and complain the government's 26 billion euro (23.1 billion pounds) investment-led stimulus has put money in bosses' pockets but done nothing to help consumers.
The latest figures show more than 440,000 jobs have disappeared, many for young people, in mainland France over the past year as the economic gloom has spread.
Sarkozy has pledged tax cuts for the lower paid and extra support for youth training as part of a raft of measures to help struggling households.
But he has resisted calls for more steps to help consumers, as the left has demanded, pointing out that household spending has held up well throughout the crisis.
(Additional reporting by Gerard Bon in Paris and Nicolas Fichot in Toulouse; Editing by Robert Woodward)
