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Hollande Wins First Round of French Presidential Election, Faces Sarkozy in the Run-Off

Hollande wins first round, sets up run-off with Sarkozy

By Joseph BAMAT (text)

France 24, 22/04/2012

 

Socialist presidential hopeful François Hollande received a welcome endorsement Wednesday from former rival, and the mother of his four children, Ségolène Royal.

 

Socialist presidential challenger François Hollande topped the first round of France’s presidential election on Sunday with 28.4 percent of votes, while incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy finished second with 25.5 percent, according to exit polls. Those figures set up a widely expected run-off between Sarkozy and the candidate of France’s main opposition party who led most voter intentions surveys before the first round.

Official results announced by France’s Interior Ministry at 8pm showed Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Front party, had conquered third place with 20%, the Ipsos polling agency said. Far-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon took 11.5%, and centrist François Bayrou 8.5%. The placement of the two leading candidates in the election were in line with dozens of opinion surveys published before Sunday’s ballot, but Le Pen’s figures were well above any of those forecasts.

Marine Le Pen far exceeded her father’s shocking second-place 16.86% score in the 2002 presidential race. Even if it was not enough to get her to the second round, the extraordinary score confirmed her presence at the head of the anti-immigration National Front party and in France's political landscape for years to come. A drop in voter intentions for Sarkozy in the final weeks of the campaign appears to have swung to the far-right camp.

Hollande, who was seen as benefitting from a wave anti-Sarkoism in France, proved a surprisingly resilient candidate. The Socialist hopeful began campaigning months before Sarkozy, and while he temporarily slipped behind Sarkozy in opinion polls, Hollande regained his frontrunner status in the final two weeks of the race.

Exit polls also showed Green candidate Eva Joly with 2%, the right-wing eurosceptic Nicolas Dupont-Aignan at 1.8%, far-left candidates Phillippe Poutou and Nathalie Arthaud at 1.2% and 0.7% respectively, and off-beat candidate Jacques Cheminade winning just 0.2%.

A run-off between Sarkozy and Hollande is scheduled on May 6, with opinion polls largely favouring the Socialist Party candidate.

Turnout better than expected

Despite fears that a lacklustre campaign combined with school holidays would lead to a historically low turnout, the French flocked to polls. Official results showed that the abstention rate in the first round at 5pm was around 19%. That abstention figure was only slightly higher than the score recorded in 2007.

A mix of blue skies and clouds over Paris on Sunday also spurred early speculation about a potential drop in voter participation. However, Pascal, a 53-year-old voter in Paris's 10th arrondissement said the weather had little bearing on election day. “We were supposed to go away this weekend, but we made the choice to stay in Paris for the election,” she said, “Rain or shine, we vote!"

Rudy Verdier, a 40-year-old shopkeeper in the northeast suburb of La Cournouve who described himself as a Sarkozy supporter, also said few of the people he knew would sit out the election. “I think most people from around here will be voting because they know today is important and it is a chance for people in this neighbourhood to express themselves," Verdier said.

Back to the Elysee?

French analysts rushed to speculate on how the whole of the election results would affect the outcome of the May 6 runoff, and on what many saw as the impending return of the Socialist Party to the Elysee Presidential palace and a Socialist-led parliament.

The French left has spent the last 10 years as the country’s main opposition group, and had to digest three consecutive presidential defeats in 1995, 2002 and 2007. Former president François Mitterrand, who won back-to-back elections in 1981 and 1988, remains France’s only Socialist head of state since the end of World War Two.

FRANCE 24's Catherine Norris Trent reporting from the Socialist Party headquarters in Paris.

Polling institutes were expected to quickly deliver surveys on who voters intended to back in the second round, and how potential alliances and endorsements would play out during the two weeks that separate the first and second round.

According to Eric Bonnet, head of opinion studies at the BVA polling firm, the transfer of second-round votes would favour the leftist candidate. "Eighty percent of Melenchon’s votes will go to François Hollande while only 35% of the votes of Marine Le Pen will be reaped by Nicolas Sarkozy,” Bonnet said before results were announced.

However, Le Pen’s surprise score and doubts about who supporters of Bayrou would ultimately back promised to make the second round a nail-biting election.

Main picture by Mehdi Chebil

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Royal endorsement gives Hollande campaign boost

Socialist presidential hopeful François Hollande received a welcome endorsement Wednesday from former rival, and the mother of his four children, Ségolène Royal.

By Lise BARCELLINI / Luke BROWN (video) Sophie PILGRIM in Rennes (text)

Royal endorsement gives Hollande campaign boost

Socialist presidential hopeful François Hollande received a welcome endorsement Wednesday from former rival, and the mother of his four children, Ségolène Royal.

 

A campaign stop in the city of Rennes, Brittany, gave Socialist presidential candidate François Hollande a boost on Wednesday, when his ex-partner, 2007 presidential socialist candidate Ségolène Royal, gave him a powerful endorsement speech.

The endorsement is a clear signal that Hollande and Royal have patched up their differences after their rumoured acrimonious separation before Royal’s failed 2007 run for the presidency. It was noted in France at the time that Hollande elected to not vocally back or campaign on behalf of Royal.

Organisers were expecting around 10,000 people but by 7pm, when Royal was supposed to be at the podium, thousands more were still waiting outside.

In photos: Socialist voters flock to Hollande rally in Rennes

“This is a shambles!” one of the security guards shouted as the crowd outside surged against the barriers and started chanting. In total, some 18,000 people turned up, making Rennes one of the Socialists' biggest campaign rallies yet. As one of the supporters who managed to get inside rightly whispered, “Such a queue can only mean one thing for Hollande... And it's certainly not a bad one!”

Even among the many that were unable to get into the main hall, where Royal and Hollande delivered their speeches, the crowds remained cheerful. “We might not be able to see him from here but at least we can hear him!” declared a group of students from Rennes who had camped out in front of a barrier by the exit.

Supporters came from all over the western region of Brittany to attend the rally, travelling many hours by car, coach or train.

After a shaky few weeks of creeping gains from the incumbent president, Nicolas Sarkozy, Hollande was in need of a boost in order to secure the top spot in the first round of the election, just 18 days away. At the rally, spirits were running high after Royal's hearty endorsement. “François is our candidate," she told the crowd. "We don’t have a moment to lose…he is the only one who can win on the Left."

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Clearly buoyed by her words - if not a little irked by her popularity - Hollande went on to lay out his plan of action for his first three months in office. With his detailed "agenda of change", he promised to freeze fuel prices, slash government salaries by 30 per cent and boost welfare payouts for families.

The crowd’s enthusiastic response seemed to spur the normally somewhat controlled Hollande on. He even managed to leave time for some Sarkozy-bashing, much to the delight of the crowd. Hollande jibbed, “The man who claims he's the boss of everything... But who's responsible for nothing!” This taunt prompted a chorus of pantomime cheers, boos and whoops from the Brittany crowd.

A Royal affair When Royal faced off against Nicolas Sarkozy in the second round of the 2007 president election, she received a massive 63 per cent of the vote in Rennes. Despite her meagre slice in the Socialist primary vote last October (7 per cent nationwide), she remains hugely popular in Brittany, where she heads the regional council of Poitou-Charentes.

“We've always had a soft spot for Ségolène in Brittany,” 70-year-old pensioner Françoise told FRANCE 24. “But we're happy to support whoever the Socialist party thinks is fit to run against Sarkozy.”

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Socialist Party campaigner Jean-Paul agreed, perhaps indicating the party’s awareness that they need to remain unified to win this election after a bruising vote to find the party’s candidate for the presidency and years of fractious political infighting. “Between me and my friends we almost all voted for either Ségolene Royal or Martine Aubry in the Socialist primary, but that doesn't make us anti-Hollande. Quite the contrary! We support the party as a whole,” emphasised Jean-Paul.

As a nod to her popularity in the region, Hollande – who barely mentioned Royal at the start of his campaign – spoke warmly of the mother to his four children. “Ségolène is here as a symbol of unity, a unity that was missing in 2007 and is there now, strong, irreversible.”

Hollande clearly hopes this endorsement will tip the balance in his favour, and thus avoid becoming the party’s fourth failed Socialist presidential candiate in a row.

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