France is buckwild again- threats of general nation wide strike
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<font size="5"><center>Is this the new mistress of France’s fortunes?</font size>
<font size="4">Debt and discontent are tearing France apart.
Will Ségolène Royal be the one to unite the country
as its first female president? </font size></center>
Sunday Times
By Matthew Campbell
April 15, 2006
With her soft voice, Ségolène Royal does not sound like a politician. She does not look much like one either. These are big pluses on the French election-campaign trail. Stylishly dressed in an apple-green designer suit with knee-length leather boots laced up over tangerine tights, she was enjoying a lunch of oysters and braised duck while musing over her chances of becoming France’s first female president. "That would be something," she said, laughing. "It would be a planetary event."
Later, in her office in the town of Poitiers, in west-central France, Royal warmed to her theme, referring to the German election of Chancellor Angela Merkel. "In France, we are saying, ‘If Germany has done it, we can do it too.’"
The soft voice belies a core of steel. In opinion polls, this elegant mother of four has consistently scored higher than any other politician and, were she the candidate in an election today, could be expected to win. The emergence of Ségo, as they often refer to the 52-year-old Royal, has rattled male politicians, highlighting a surprisingly chauvinistic streak in a country so progressive in other domains. "They’re afraid," says Royal, who dismisses as "dinosaurs" the men in her own Socialist political family who have poured scorn on her presidential hopes. "They’re afraid I am going to take their place."
They have every reason to be. From the rejection of the EU constitution to mass rioting and protests, the French are in an unforgiving mood as they prepare for a presidential election in just over a year. They are fed up with the male-dominated elite, the familiar cast of politicians, from the outgoing centre-right President Jacques Chirac to the wrinkly Socialist luminary Jack Lang – the former minister with the all-year tan – who have dominated the political landscape for more than two decades. Could the time have come for an unorthodox female leader in a country that has never before had a woman as head of state?
Perhaps. France might have some of the world’s most dynamic companies, but it is in dreadful shape. The economy grew by a mere 1.4% in 2005, and wealth per person has been overtaken by Britain’s and Ireland’s. While many of the brightest emigrate in search of better job opportunities – London is one of the favourite destinations – the state is piling up debt to support the rising health and retirement costs of an ageing population and mass unemployment: almost a quarter of potential workers under 26 are on the dole, compared with 13% in Britain. And as public debt increases, France’s shrinking population currently works shorter hours than those in most advanced countries. Something has to give.
According to Michel Pébereau, chairman of the BNP Paribas bank, debt could soar from the current 65% to 100% of GDP by 2014, resulting in a "foreseeable reduction of our capacity to create jobs and wealth". Or as François Bayrou, a centre-right politician, put it, "If it [France] were a company, it would already have been declared bankrupt. If it were a family, the bailiffs would be banging at the door."
He believes part of the problem is that France has never been properly "déMarxisé": a recent opinion poll found that 66% of the British agree that the free market is the best available system, but the number is only 36% in France, one of the few countries left in the world where the Communist party is still respected.
The strong dirigiste state is virtually a religion, and more than one quarter of all jobs are still in the public sector. Suspicion of money and profit runs deep. Even supposedly Conservative politicians such as Chirac see Britain’s economic model as "free-market misery". Efforts at even modest reform have repeatedly foundered on fears that the "French way" is under attack and that the country’s soul will be drowned in the torrent of globalisation. In this climate, can any leader find a new way forward to deliver France from the crisis?
Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy, the interior minister who is her most likely rival in an election, believe they can. Both are politicians outside the usual mould. This could make them the protagonists in one of the most significant contests of modern French history: "Ségo vs Sarko". Both are in their early fifties – extraordinarily young for French presidential candidates – and both are at odds with their parties, a detail that complicates life considerably for Royal, considering that she lives with François Hollande, the Socialist leader.
She has always had an unconventional streak, and has lived with Hollande for three decades without marrying him. They met at the Ecole National d’Administration, or ENA, a nursery for the ruling elite. Though she shares the same technocratic background as the older generation of politicians, her respect for the way Tony Blair modernised his party puts her at odds with their conventional wisdom. She has praised the "flexibility" with which he brought down unemployment, and disdains the Anglophobia so common these days in her own party. "I hate the way he has been demonised over here," she says. In addition, in a country hardly known for its puritanical streak, her social conservatism has also made her controversial. Her opposition to single-sex families, which has alienated the gay vote, goes against party orthodoxy, as does her recent campaign against advertisements for thong underwear. She has carved out her own niche in economic matters too. Unlike other socialists, she has criticised the wastefulness of the 35-hour week and denounced the "squandering" of public money.
Sarkozy, for his part, has already changed French politics with the introduction of what are widely derided as "Anglo-Saxon" policies such as "zero-tolerance policing" and "American-style" campaigning techniques. The son of a Hungarian immigrant, he can delight in not being an énarque, as they refer to graduates from ENA. "I am for the total reconstruction of France," he says, advocating what he calls a complete "rupture" with the past.
This will not be easy, however, judging by the experiences of Dominique de Villepin, the prime minister vying with Sarkozy for the centre-right presidential nomination. De Villepin’s attempt to inject a bit more flexibility into the rigid labour market hardly amounts to Sarkozy’s bold "rupture", but even this bit of tinkering recently brought the country to a standstill in a series of demonstrations and strikes. The contrat première embauche (CPE), or first employment contract, was an attempt to encourage employers to take on more young workers by giving them the power to sack them without notice if they had been employed for under two years. In so doing, he united both those young French people who were opposed to change and wanted the state to guarantee them a future, and those youngsters from the ghettos who felt excluded at a much deeper level. This failure to convince the very people who might benefit from such a law rules out any more serious reforming before the elections, and might even conspire against a reform package being introduced after the vote. De Villepin may be to blame for botching a long-overdue rendezvous with renewal. How could he have got it so wrong?
The answer may lie in observing France’s prime minister at work and play. He epitomises an elite removed from the everyday lives of his own citizens. In February this year, I travelled with him on an official visit to Moscow to meet Vladimir Putin. The temperature outside was -12C, and though it was only 10am, inside the French Embassy servants were handing around glasses of vodka to ward off the cold. De Villepin, a tall, silver-haired figure, was locked in animated conversation with Sergei Ivanov, the Russian defence minister. They were talking in Spanish, one of the languages they have in common. De Villepin did not let slip any opportunity to flaunt his linguistic skills – and general brilliance. Even recent events may fail to dent his astounding confidence. He has written books – about history, mainly – and poetry. He has a beautiful wife and two children: a son named Arthur, after Rimbaud, the poet, and a daughter who has modelled for Elle. Admirers claim he is irresistible to women. From this lofty height, he is said to look down his nose at members of parliament – the prime minister calls them "connards", or arseholes – preferring the company of writers and intellectuals. Put a curly wig on him and de Villepin would no doubt feel at home in an 18th-century Parisian salon. A career diplomat, he graduated from the ENA in the same year as Royal but, unlike her, has never been elected to public office.
This does not stop him dreaming of glory, and he is prepared to take the daftest risks to achieve it. As foreign minister, he sent a team of French secret agents to rescue his former pupil Ingrid Betancourt, a Colombian presidential candidate, from Marxist rebels in the jungle. The idea was to fly her back to Paris in time for the quatorze juillet (July 14) celebrations. De Villepin would be hailed as a hero. However, when the rescuers landed in Brazil in their unmarked French military aircraft laden with guns and cash, they were arrested by police on suspicion of drug-trafficking. The unfortunate Betancourt is still in captivity.
This in no way dampened de Villepin’s appetite for risk-taking. His posturing and puffed-up sense of mission make him an embodiment of some of the most irritating – and, to some, endearing – aspects of French national character. "It is a heavy burden, being prime minister," he acknowledged during his visit to the French embassy in Moscow. "There are so many things to be concerned about."
When he was appointed in June last year, de Villepin made reducing unemployment levels his priority. Laudable enough. Comparing himself perhaps to Napoleon, his hero, on the eve of his finest victory at Austerlitz, the prime minister has been talking ever since in military metaphors to signal his commitment to the battle. "We will be fighting on every front," he has said. One of his first steps was to draw up the law that has united France in protest. It was rushed through parliament by decree in February, but nonetheless, as he travelled to Moscow, de Villepin was in a buoyant mood.
On his plane, unaware of what was still to come, the tall, patrician prime minister joked with aides about how small Nicolas Sarkozy is. He pointed out that France has never had a short president. De Villepin has loathed the interior minister ever since the 1995 election, when Sarkozy betrayed Chirac by siding with his rival, Edouard Balladur.
One of his cruellest jibes is to describe his diminutive opponent as the "hooker" in a game of rugby, who does all the work, getting the ball out of the scrum, only to see it passed onto a taller, faster figure who comes running out of nowhere to score the try. No points for guessing who that is. As he greeted Russian businessmen at a dinner at the start of his Moscow visit on the evening of February 13, Russian words tripped off his tongue and, as a band struck up the Marseillaise that evening, he might have imagined himself already in the presidential Elysée Palace: his guests that evening awarded him a bust, cast in bronze, of himself.
Forces beyond his control were conspiring against his dream of glory, however. Instead of Austerlitz, the battle was beginning to look more like de Villepin’s Waterloo.
As he strutted about in Moscow, the aircraft carrier Clemenceau was rumbling across the Indian Ocean. She was supposed to have been dismantled in an Indian port. Then Greenpeace complained about her dumping asbestos on the Third World, and Chirac ordered the ship home. France, for once, would have to deal with her own toxic waste. There could hardly be a better symbol of the country’s decrepitude and lack of direction and, for a proud French public, the spectacle of this naval relic and symbol of past glories being treated with such lèse-majesté was deeply unpleasant. De Villepin’s approval rating began to fall.
Further humiliation followed. Within a month of his return from Moscow, the student protests began in earnest. Again and again, millions have taken to the streets to vent their fury against the "Kleenex job contract" that would make workers as expendable as tissue paper. The battle of the employment law, with three-quarters of French youth saying they wanted civil-service jobs and not the risks of the open market – was the latest in a string of calamities that started when voters turned down the proposed EU constitution in May last year, in a humiliating referendum result for Chirac, who had argued it was France’s best defence against what he called the "new communism" – the liberal economic savagery practised by Britain.
Barely a month later came the news that London, not Paris, had been awarded the 2012 Olympics. Then, no sooner had Chirac recovered from a stroke than rioting broke out in the immigrant suburbs, in which 10,000 cars and 200 buildings were burnt; an orgy of destruction that focused global attention on the racial malaise in Europe’s heart.
It was these pockets of want in the banlieues, literally "places of banishment", that de Villepin was trying to help with his employment law. To some, however, it was akin to putting a plaster onto a wooden leg, a futile exercise demonstrating the extent to which de Villepin was a symptom of France’s problems – not a solution.
So much for de Villepin. But what of the other potential French presidents? Ségolène Royal, though she has been part of the political scenery for at least two decades, has the advantage of somehow appearing fresh. Her glossy hair, blue eyes and blinding white teeth make her look more like a glamorous television anchorwoman than a politician.
And her sense of style adds to the clichéd fantasy of the French woman able to manage the double burden of career and children while enjoying her cheese and wine without putting on weight.
"It has not always been easy," she told me when we met over lunch in Poitiers, the capital of the Poitou-Charentes region, her fiefdom. Her youngest daughter, 14-year-old Flora, she said, was "stressed out" by all the attention being heaped on the Royal family. This was not just because of the army of cameramen and journalists who follow Ségo wherever she goes.
Hollande, her partner, had been dreaming about being a candidate in the elections long before he realised – reluctantly – that the mother of his children stood a better chance: opinion polls have put her streets ahead of "Monsieur Royal", as his enemies call him. "Doubtless the French are thirsty for novelty," was how a tetchy Hollande described the appeal of his partner.
One can only wonder what effect all this has had on the home life of France’s star political couple. Whether or not Hollande ends up endorsing the mother of his children, there is no shortage of other party barons who believe they are more entitled than her to represent the left at the next election, among them such has-beens as Lionel Jospin, the former Trotskyist schoolteacher and prime minister who was supposed to have retired from politics after his humiliating defeat in the last presidential election in 2002.
Even more outraged by Royal’s entry into the ring was Laurent Fabius, the balding former prime minister who has been cogitating since childhood on how to win the presidency. After being told the news, he snidely asked: "Who is going to look after the children?" He may come to regret that remark. "It was hurtful and humiliating," said Royal.
Royal has had her revenge, however, robbing other would-be Socialist presidential contenders of the media limelight they so crave. She was followed, like a movie star, around the Paris agricultural show by a cortege of photographers on February 28, while a bewildered-looking Lang was seen wandering about by himself. For Royal, the show, a highlight of the political calendar, was an important test: how would she fare in this mucky, male-dominated milieu?
Kitted out that day in what looked suspiciously like a designer safari suit, Royal took to chatting with farmers and breeders with a nonchalant ease that would have impressed even Chirac, a veteran and master of the event who happily munches his way around all the stalls, sampling as much sausage, cheese and meat as is handed to him.
One man in particular will remember Royal’s visit. Jean-Michel Lemétayer, the president of a powerful agricultural union, returned from a hearty lunch to find Royal in front of his stand. In private, Royal had criticised Lemétayer for not being aggressive enough in seeking compensation from the government for chicken farmers affected by bird flu. Now she let him have it. "There are farmers’ families who cannot make ends meet and who need aid," she said. "Get angry!" she snapped. So much for the soft voice.
One of eight children of a strict French army colonel, she developed a reputation for radicalism at ENA that earned her the nickname "the barefoot énarque" – a reaction, perhaps, against the views of an extremely conservative father. She came under the guidance of François Mitterrand, the last Socialist president, who steered her into a series of increasingly important jobs in the education and health ministries – although apparently not, as rumour would have it, into his bed. Her stands against television violence, pornography and teenage pregnancy brought her into the limelight, winning her a following among women voters.
After the death of Mitterrand in 1996 she faded from view but, in regional elections two years ago, she erupted again onto the stage with a stunning conquest of the presidency of Poitou-Charentes, a region she has made the springboard for her presidential ambitions.
The realisation that Royal is for real has finally dawned on Sarkozy as well. On January 19, he was on a flight to Le Havre when an aide pointed to a picture of him surrounded by 18 men in dark suits – his entourage at the interior ministry. Only one woman was partially visible in the picture. He was furious and got on the phone to his office. "Why hasn’t Roselyne been appointed yet?" he asked, referring to Roselyne Bachelot, the Euro MP he had selected for a senior post on the executive council of the Union for a Popular Movement party (UMP), of which he is president. He was told about some procedural hitch. "I don’t give a damn," he shrieked.
Sarkozy, 51, has every reason to feel vulnerable when it comes to the female vote. Last year, Cecilia, his wife and chief adviser, left him for another man, complaining that he had treated her like "furniture". He was livid. Cecilia had been one of his chief political props. In a strategy that revolutionised the political landscape in a country whose leaders had always zealously guarded their privacy, he was always happy to parade his family in front of the cameras.
The glamorous power couple were often seen cycling together. Even their son, Louis, had an unwitting role in this Gallic version of Camelot: if Sarkozy, in a meeting in his office, wanted to impress upon a visitor his human side, he would get an aide to roll a ball through the door. Little Louis would run after it into the office to his adoring papa.
This approach ended up backfiring on him when the French press, habitually hesitant about intruding into the private lives of politicians, began covering the break-up of his relationship in lurid detail, citing the important role that Cecilia had played in his entourage. Sarkozy was furious, but not inconsolable. It emerged that he too was seeing somebody else – a young political journalist.
In January he persuaded Cecilia to return to him from New York, where she had moved in with Richard Attias, a well-connected ad man. By February, though, the relationship was once again on the rocks and the couple had a blazing row in Sarkozy’s interior-ministry office on March 1. The next day, Cecilia left for New York.
On International Women’s Day, Sarkozy announced that he was setting up a website for women. By then, Bachelot had been installed as the UMP’s secretary-general. He gave another signal of his interest in promoting women by supporting the party’s selection of Françoise de Panafieu, a Conservative MP and former minister, as a candidate for mayor of Paris.
When it comes to the female vote, however, Sarkozy can hardly compete with Royal. In a country where women’s wages are notoriously lower than men’s, young, working women, according to one pollster, see Ségo as a "career weapon" whose success in politics will help them "personally to progress in their companies". For many women, no doubt, she also represents revenge on the ambient machismo exemplified by Chirac’s outburst at a European summit with Margaret Thatcher in 1988: "What does she want, this housewife – my balls on a tray?"
Things have been complicated in other ways, too, for Sarkozy. Even before the latest unrest, he was struggling to escape being too closely identified with the failings of the regime – a difficult manoeuvre, considering that he is such a prominent member of the government. Much as he approved of de Villepin’s employment law, it was not the radical overhaul that he believes the labour market needs, and the watered-down version that went into effect after Chirac’s intervention did not seem to merit such popular uproar. It did, however, afford him the chance of grabbing centre stage in finding a compromise between students and union leaders. But it did not bode well for what economists such as Nicolas Baverez, the author of France in Freefall, believe are the minimum reforms necessary to halt the decline: abolition of the 35-hour week, deregulation of the labour market, the reduction of government and the streamlining of health and other public services.
By contrast, the employment row has done no harm to Royal. Unlike some of the other socialist heavyweights, she declined to take part in any of the protests but made a point of announcing that she would not recognise the first employment contract in her region. At the same time, she made clear in an interview that she was not against loosening the labour code but opposed the way de Villepin had rammed his law through parliament without consultation – an example, she said, of "stupidity" that had resulted in "a general mess". To say any more at this stage could undermine her long-term position. Until her nomination is secure, she is likely to keep quiet. Quite where the Socialists intend to lead the people is unclear: their policies won’t be unveiled until the publication of their manifesto later this year.
It is difficult to be optimistic about France’s future, particularly when hearing what Jacques Godfrain, a Conservative MP, had to say when he emerged from a lunch with Chirac and his ministers in February. "There was a strong sense of agreement to the effect that France is ungovernable. But that she likes being governed." Others saw greater wisdom in General Charles de Gaulle. "Mayhem, that’s the sickness of the French," he once said. "I don’t think we will ever cure them of it." It is hard to imagine, sometimes, why anyone would try.
Candidate: Segolene Royal
The star of the opinion polls is an unorthodox Socialist contender because of her support for Tony Blair and her opposition to the 35-hour week. Although she served under the former Socialist President Mitterrand, she manages to seem fresh; and her campaigns against child pornography and conjugal violence have won her a following among women voters, which she is using, despite opposition from ‘dinosaurs’ within her own party, as a springboard for her presidential ambitions.
Chances of being elected: good
Candidate: Nicolas Sarkozy
The most likely standard-bearer for the centre-right, Sarkozy advocates ‘reconstruction’ and ‘rupture’ with the past. He would deregulate the labour code, streamline health and other public services and reduce the size of the government. As the interior minister, he has courted votes with his tough talk on crime and immigration.
Chances of being elected: good
Candidate: Dominique de Villepin
A protege of Jacques Chirac, he represents a discredited system. Despite a disastrous effort to soften the rigid labour code, he has vowed to protect the French social model against the ‘Anglo-Saxon’ free-market impulse. A believer in restoring France’s lost glory, he thinks destiny has selected him as his country’s saviour.
Chances of being elected: poor
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2099-2121725_1,00.html
<font size="4">Debt and discontent are tearing France apart.
Will Ségolène Royal be the one to unite the country
as its first female president? </font size></center>
Sunday Times
By Matthew Campbell
April 15, 2006
With her soft voice, Ségolène Royal does not sound like a politician. She does not look much like one either. These are big pluses on the French election-campaign trail. Stylishly dressed in an apple-green designer suit with knee-length leather boots laced up over tangerine tights, she was enjoying a lunch of oysters and braised duck while musing over her chances of becoming France’s first female president. "That would be something," she said, laughing. "It would be a planetary event."
Later, in her office in the town of Poitiers, in west-central France, Royal warmed to her theme, referring to the German election of Chancellor Angela Merkel. "In France, we are saying, ‘If Germany has done it, we can do it too.’"
The soft voice belies a core of steel. In opinion polls, this elegant mother of four has consistently scored higher than any other politician and, were she the candidate in an election today, could be expected to win. The emergence of Ségo, as they often refer to the 52-year-old Royal, has rattled male politicians, highlighting a surprisingly chauvinistic streak in a country so progressive in other domains. "They’re afraid," says Royal, who dismisses as "dinosaurs" the men in her own Socialist political family who have poured scorn on her presidential hopes. "They’re afraid I am going to take their place."
They have every reason to be. From the rejection of the EU constitution to mass rioting and protests, the French are in an unforgiving mood as they prepare for a presidential election in just over a year. They are fed up with the male-dominated elite, the familiar cast of politicians, from the outgoing centre-right President Jacques Chirac to the wrinkly Socialist luminary Jack Lang – the former minister with the all-year tan – who have dominated the political landscape for more than two decades. Could the time have come for an unorthodox female leader in a country that has never before had a woman as head of state?
Perhaps. France might have some of the world’s most dynamic companies, but it is in dreadful shape. The economy grew by a mere 1.4% in 2005, and wealth per person has been overtaken by Britain’s and Ireland’s. While many of the brightest emigrate in search of better job opportunities – London is one of the favourite destinations – the state is piling up debt to support the rising health and retirement costs of an ageing population and mass unemployment: almost a quarter of potential workers under 26 are on the dole, compared with 13% in Britain. And as public debt increases, France’s shrinking population currently works shorter hours than those in most advanced countries. Something has to give.
According to Michel Pébereau, chairman of the BNP Paribas bank, debt could soar from the current 65% to 100% of GDP by 2014, resulting in a "foreseeable reduction of our capacity to create jobs and wealth". Or as François Bayrou, a centre-right politician, put it, "If it [France] were a company, it would already have been declared bankrupt. If it were a family, the bailiffs would be banging at the door."
He believes part of the problem is that France has never been properly "déMarxisé": a recent opinion poll found that 66% of the British agree that the free market is the best available system, but the number is only 36% in France, one of the few countries left in the world where the Communist party is still respected.
The strong dirigiste state is virtually a religion, and more than one quarter of all jobs are still in the public sector. Suspicion of money and profit runs deep. Even supposedly Conservative politicians such as Chirac see Britain’s economic model as "free-market misery". Efforts at even modest reform have repeatedly foundered on fears that the "French way" is under attack and that the country’s soul will be drowned in the torrent of globalisation. In this climate, can any leader find a new way forward to deliver France from the crisis?
Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy, the interior minister who is her most likely rival in an election, believe they can. Both are politicians outside the usual mould. This could make them the protagonists in one of the most significant contests of modern French history: "Ségo vs Sarko". Both are in their early fifties – extraordinarily young for French presidential candidates – and both are at odds with their parties, a detail that complicates life considerably for Royal, considering that she lives with François Hollande, the Socialist leader.
She has always had an unconventional streak, and has lived with Hollande for three decades without marrying him. They met at the Ecole National d’Administration, or ENA, a nursery for the ruling elite. Though she shares the same technocratic background as the older generation of politicians, her respect for the way Tony Blair modernised his party puts her at odds with their conventional wisdom. She has praised the "flexibility" with which he brought down unemployment, and disdains the Anglophobia so common these days in her own party. "I hate the way he has been demonised over here," she says. In addition, in a country hardly known for its puritanical streak, her social conservatism has also made her controversial. Her opposition to single-sex families, which has alienated the gay vote, goes against party orthodoxy, as does her recent campaign against advertisements for thong underwear. She has carved out her own niche in economic matters too. Unlike other socialists, she has criticised the wastefulness of the 35-hour week and denounced the "squandering" of public money.
Sarkozy, for his part, has already changed French politics with the introduction of what are widely derided as "Anglo-Saxon" policies such as "zero-tolerance policing" and "American-style" campaigning techniques. The son of a Hungarian immigrant, he can delight in not being an énarque, as they refer to graduates from ENA. "I am for the total reconstruction of France," he says, advocating what he calls a complete "rupture" with the past.
This will not be easy, however, judging by the experiences of Dominique de Villepin, the prime minister vying with Sarkozy for the centre-right presidential nomination. De Villepin’s attempt to inject a bit more flexibility into the rigid labour market hardly amounts to Sarkozy’s bold "rupture", but even this bit of tinkering recently brought the country to a standstill in a series of demonstrations and strikes. The contrat première embauche (CPE), or first employment contract, was an attempt to encourage employers to take on more young workers by giving them the power to sack them without notice if they had been employed for under two years. In so doing, he united both those young French people who were opposed to change and wanted the state to guarantee them a future, and those youngsters from the ghettos who felt excluded at a much deeper level. This failure to convince the very people who might benefit from such a law rules out any more serious reforming before the elections, and might even conspire against a reform package being introduced after the vote. De Villepin may be to blame for botching a long-overdue rendezvous with renewal. How could he have got it so wrong?
The answer may lie in observing France’s prime minister at work and play. He epitomises an elite removed from the everyday lives of his own citizens. In February this year, I travelled with him on an official visit to Moscow to meet Vladimir Putin. The temperature outside was -12C, and though it was only 10am, inside the French Embassy servants were handing around glasses of vodka to ward off the cold. De Villepin, a tall, silver-haired figure, was locked in animated conversation with Sergei Ivanov, the Russian defence minister. They were talking in Spanish, one of the languages they have in common. De Villepin did not let slip any opportunity to flaunt his linguistic skills – and general brilliance. Even recent events may fail to dent his astounding confidence. He has written books – about history, mainly – and poetry. He has a beautiful wife and two children: a son named Arthur, after Rimbaud, the poet, and a daughter who has modelled for Elle. Admirers claim he is irresistible to women. From this lofty height, he is said to look down his nose at members of parliament – the prime minister calls them "connards", or arseholes – preferring the company of writers and intellectuals. Put a curly wig on him and de Villepin would no doubt feel at home in an 18th-century Parisian salon. A career diplomat, he graduated from the ENA in the same year as Royal but, unlike her, has never been elected to public office.
This does not stop him dreaming of glory, and he is prepared to take the daftest risks to achieve it. As foreign minister, he sent a team of French secret agents to rescue his former pupil Ingrid Betancourt, a Colombian presidential candidate, from Marxist rebels in the jungle. The idea was to fly her back to Paris in time for the quatorze juillet (July 14) celebrations. De Villepin would be hailed as a hero. However, when the rescuers landed in Brazil in their unmarked French military aircraft laden with guns and cash, they were arrested by police on suspicion of drug-trafficking. The unfortunate Betancourt is still in captivity.
This in no way dampened de Villepin’s appetite for risk-taking. His posturing and puffed-up sense of mission make him an embodiment of some of the most irritating – and, to some, endearing – aspects of French national character. "It is a heavy burden, being prime minister," he acknowledged during his visit to the French embassy in Moscow. "There are so many things to be concerned about."
When he was appointed in June last year, de Villepin made reducing unemployment levels his priority. Laudable enough. Comparing himself perhaps to Napoleon, his hero, on the eve of his finest victory at Austerlitz, the prime minister has been talking ever since in military metaphors to signal his commitment to the battle. "We will be fighting on every front," he has said. One of his first steps was to draw up the law that has united France in protest. It was rushed through parliament by decree in February, but nonetheless, as he travelled to Moscow, de Villepin was in a buoyant mood.
On his plane, unaware of what was still to come, the tall, patrician prime minister joked with aides about how small Nicolas Sarkozy is. He pointed out that France has never had a short president. De Villepin has loathed the interior minister ever since the 1995 election, when Sarkozy betrayed Chirac by siding with his rival, Edouard Balladur.
One of his cruellest jibes is to describe his diminutive opponent as the "hooker" in a game of rugby, who does all the work, getting the ball out of the scrum, only to see it passed onto a taller, faster figure who comes running out of nowhere to score the try. No points for guessing who that is. As he greeted Russian businessmen at a dinner at the start of his Moscow visit on the evening of February 13, Russian words tripped off his tongue and, as a band struck up the Marseillaise that evening, he might have imagined himself already in the presidential Elysée Palace: his guests that evening awarded him a bust, cast in bronze, of himself.
Forces beyond his control were conspiring against his dream of glory, however. Instead of Austerlitz, the battle was beginning to look more like de Villepin’s Waterloo.
As he strutted about in Moscow, the aircraft carrier Clemenceau was rumbling across the Indian Ocean. She was supposed to have been dismantled in an Indian port. Then Greenpeace complained about her dumping asbestos on the Third World, and Chirac ordered the ship home. France, for once, would have to deal with her own toxic waste. There could hardly be a better symbol of the country’s decrepitude and lack of direction and, for a proud French public, the spectacle of this naval relic and symbol of past glories being treated with such lèse-majesté was deeply unpleasant. De Villepin’s approval rating began to fall.
Further humiliation followed. Within a month of his return from Moscow, the student protests began in earnest. Again and again, millions have taken to the streets to vent their fury against the "Kleenex job contract" that would make workers as expendable as tissue paper. The battle of the employment law, with three-quarters of French youth saying they wanted civil-service jobs and not the risks of the open market – was the latest in a string of calamities that started when voters turned down the proposed EU constitution in May last year, in a humiliating referendum result for Chirac, who had argued it was France’s best defence against what he called the "new communism" – the liberal economic savagery practised by Britain.
Barely a month later came the news that London, not Paris, had been awarded the 2012 Olympics. Then, no sooner had Chirac recovered from a stroke than rioting broke out in the immigrant suburbs, in which 10,000 cars and 200 buildings were burnt; an orgy of destruction that focused global attention on the racial malaise in Europe’s heart.
It was these pockets of want in the banlieues, literally "places of banishment", that de Villepin was trying to help with his employment law. To some, however, it was akin to putting a plaster onto a wooden leg, a futile exercise demonstrating the extent to which de Villepin was a symptom of France’s problems – not a solution.
So much for de Villepin. But what of the other potential French presidents? Ségolène Royal, though she has been part of the political scenery for at least two decades, has the advantage of somehow appearing fresh. Her glossy hair, blue eyes and blinding white teeth make her look more like a glamorous television anchorwoman than a politician.
And her sense of style adds to the clichéd fantasy of the French woman able to manage the double burden of career and children while enjoying her cheese and wine without putting on weight.
"It has not always been easy," she told me when we met over lunch in Poitiers, the capital of the Poitou-Charentes region, her fiefdom. Her youngest daughter, 14-year-old Flora, she said, was "stressed out" by all the attention being heaped on the Royal family. This was not just because of the army of cameramen and journalists who follow Ségo wherever she goes.
Hollande, her partner, had been dreaming about being a candidate in the elections long before he realised – reluctantly – that the mother of his children stood a better chance: opinion polls have put her streets ahead of "Monsieur Royal", as his enemies call him. "Doubtless the French are thirsty for novelty," was how a tetchy Hollande described the appeal of his partner.
One can only wonder what effect all this has had on the home life of France’s star political couple. Whether or not Hollande ends up endorsing the mother of his children, there is no shortage of other party barons who believe they are more entitled than her to represent the left at the next election, among them such has-beens as Lionel Jospin, the former Trotskyist schoolteacher and prime minister who was supposed to have retired from politics after his humiliating defeat in the last presidential election in 2002.
Even more outraged by Royal’s entry into the ring was Laurent Fabius, the balding former prime minister who has been cogitating since childhood on how to win the presidency. After being told the news, he snidely asked: "Who is going to look after the children?" He may come to regret that remark. "It was hurtful and humiliating," said Royal.
Royal has had her revenge, however, robbing other would-be Socialist presidential contenders of the media limelight they so crave. She was followed, like a movie star, around the Paris agricultural show by a cortege of photographers on February 28, while a bewildered-looking Lang was seen wandering about by himself. For Royal, the show, a highlight of the political calendar, was an important test: how would she fare in this mucky, male-dominated milieu?
Kitted out that day in what looked suspiciously like a designer safari suit, Royal took to chatting with farmers and breeders with a nonchalant ease that would have impressed even Chirac, a veteran and master of the event who happily munches his way around all the stalls, sampling as much sausage, cheese and meat as is handed to him.
One man in particular will remember Royal’s visit. Jean-Michel Lemétayer, the president of a powerful agricultural union, returned from a hearty lunch to find Royal in front of his stand. In private, Royal had criticised Lemétayer for not being aggressive enough in seeking compensation from the government for chicken farmers affected by bird flu. Now she let him have it. "There are farmers’ families who cannot make ends meet and who need aid," she said. "Get angry!" she snapped. So much for the soft voice.
One of eight children of a strict French army colonel, she developed a reputation for radicalism at ENA that earned her the nickname "the barefoot énarque" – a reaction, perhaps, against the views of an extremely conservative father. She came under the guidance of François Mitterrand, the last Socialist president, who steered her into a series of increasingly important jobs in the education and health ministries – although apparently not, as rumour would have it, into his bed. Her stands against television violence, pornography and teenage pregnancy brought her into the limelight, winning her a following among women voters.
After the death of Mitterrand in 1996 she faded from view but, in regional elections two years ago, she erupted again onto the stage with a stunning conquest of the presidency of Poitou-Charentes, a region she has made the springboard for her presidential ambitions.
The realisation that Royal is for real has finally dawned on Sarkozy as well. On January 19, he was on a flight to Le Havre when an aide pointed to a picture of him surrounded by 18 men in dark suits – his entourage at the interior ministry. Only one woman was partially visible in the picture. He was furious and got on the phone to his office. "Why hasn’t Roselyne been appointed yet?" he asked, referring to Roselyne Bachelot, the Euro MP he had selected for a senior post on the executive council of the Union for a Popular Movement party (UMP), of which he is president. He was told about some procedural hitch. "I don’t give a damn," he shrieked.
Sarkozy, 51, has every reason to feel vulnerable when it comes to the female vote. Last year, Cecilia, his wife and chief adviser, left him for another man, complaining that he had treated her like "furniture". He was livid. Cecilia had been one of his chief political props. In a strategy that revolutionised the political landscape in a country whose leaders had always zealously guarded their privacy, he was always happy to parade his family in front of the cameras.
The glamorous power couple were often seen cycling together. Even their son, Louis, had an unwitting role in this Gallic version of Camelot: if Sarkozy, in a meeting in his office, wanted to impress upon a visitor his human side, he would get an aide to roll a ball through the door. Little Louis would run after it into the office to his adoring papa.
This approach ended up backfiring on him when the French press, habitually hesitant about intruding into the private lives of politicians, began covering the break-up of his relationship in lurid detail, citing the important role that Cecilia had played in his entourage. Sarkozy was furious, but not inconsolable. It emerged that he too was seeing somebody else – a young political journalist.
In January he persuaded Cecilia to return to him from New York, where she had moved in with Richard Attias, a well-connected ad man. By February, though, the relationship was once again on the rocks and the couple had a blazing row in Sarkozy’s interior-ministry office on March 1. The next day, Cecilia left for New York.
On International Women’s Day, Sarkozy announced that he was setting up a website for women. By then, Bachelot had been installed as the UMP’s secretary-general. He gave another signal of his interest in promoting women by supporting the party’s selection of Françoise de Panafieu, a Conservative MP and former minister, as a candidate for mayor of Paris.
When it comes to the female vote, however, Sarkozy can hardly compete with Royal. In a country where women’s wages are notoriously lower than men’s, young, working women, according to one pollster, see Ségo as a "career weapon" whose success in politics will help them "personally to progress in their companies". For many women, no doubt, she also represents revenge on the ambient machismo exemplified by Chirac’s outburst at a European summit with Margaret Thatcher in 1988: "What does she want, this housewife – my balls on a tray?"
Things have been complicated in other ways, too, for Sarkozy. Even before the latest unrest, he was struggling to escape being too closely identified with the failings of the regime – a difficult manoeuvre, considering that he is such a prominent member of the government. Much as he approved of de Villepin’s employment law, it was not the radical overhaul that he believes the labour market needs, and the watered-down version that went into effect after Chirac’s intervention did not seem to merit such popular uproar. It did, however, afford him the chance of grabbing centre stage in finding a compromise between students and union leaders. But it did not bode well for what economists such as Nicolas Baverez, the author of France in Freefall, believe are the minimum reforms necessary to halt the decline: abolition of the 35-hour week, deregulation of the labour market, the reduction of government and the streamlining of health and other public services.
By contrast, the employment row has done no harm to Royal. Unlike some of the other socialist heavyweights, she declined to take part in any of the protests but made a point of announcing that she would not recognise the first employment contract in her region. At the same time, she made clear in an interview that she was not against loosening the labour code but opposed the way de Villepin had rammed his law through parliament without consultation – an example, she said, of "stupidity" that had resulted in "a general mess". To say any more at this stage could undermine her long-term position. Until her nomination is secure, she is likely to keep quiet. Quite where the Socialists intend to lead the people is unclear: their policies won’t be unveiled until the publication of their manifesto later this year.
It is difficult to be optimistic about France’s future, particularly when hearing what Jacques Godfrain, a Conservative MP, had to say when he emerged from a lunch with Chirac and his ministers in February. "There was a strong sense of agreement to the effect that France is ungovernable. But that she likes being governed." Others saw greater wisdom in General Charles de Gaulle. "Mayhem, that’s the sickness of the French," he once said. "I don’t think we will ever cure them of it." It is hard to imagine, sometimes, why anyone would try.
Candidate: Segolene Royal
The star of the opinion polls is an unorthodox Socialist contender because of her support for Tony Blair and her opposition to the 35-hour week. Although she served under the former Socialist President Mitterrand, she manages to seem fresh; and her campaigns against child pornography and conjugal violence have won her a following among women voters, which she is using, despite opposition from ‘dinosaurs’ within her own party, as a springboard for her presidential ambitions.
Chances of being elected: good
Candidate: Nicolas Sarkozy
The most likely standard-bearer for the centre-right, Sarkozy advocates ‘reconstruction’ and ‘rupture’ with the past. He would deregulate the labour code, streamline health and other public services and reduce the size of the government. As the interior minister, he has courted votes with his tough talk on crime and immigration.
Chances of being elected: good
Candidate: Dominique de Villepin
A protege of Jacques Chirac, he represents a discredited system. Despite a disastrous effort to soften the rigid labour code, he has vowed to protect the French social model against the ‘Anglo-Saxon’ free-market impulse. A believer in restoring France’s lost glory, he thinks destiny has selected him as his country’s saviour.
Chances of being elected: poor
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2099-2121725_1,00.html
http://www.questionsquestions.net/docs/may68_vs_degaulle.html
QueEx said:<font size="5"><center>Is this the new mistress of France’s fortunes?</font size>
<font size="4">Debt and discontent are tearing France apart.
Will Ségolène Royal be the one to unite the country
as its first female president? </font size></center>
Sunday Times
By Matthew Campbell
April 15, 2006
With her soft voice, Ségolène Royal does not sound like a politician. She does not look much like one either. These are big pluses on the French election-campaign trail. Stylishly dressed in an apple-green designer suit with knee-length leather boots laced up over tangerine tights, she was enjoying a lunch of oysters and braised duck while musing over her chances of becoming France’s first female president. "That would be something," she said, laughing. "It would be a planetary event."
Later, in her office in the town of Poitiers, in west-central France, Royal warmed to her theme, referring to the German election of Chancellor Angela Merkel. "In France, we are saying, ‘If Germany has done it, we can do it too.’"
The soft voice belies a core of steel. In opinion polls, this elegant mother of four has consistently scored higher than any other politician and, were she the candidate in an election today, could be expected to win. The emergence of Ségo, as they often refer to the 52-year-old Royal, has rattled male politicians, highlighting a surprisingly chauvinistic streak in a country so progressive in other domains. "They’re afraid," says Royal, who dismisses as "dinosaurs" the men in her own Socialist political family who have poured scorn on her presidential hopes. "They’re afraid I am going to take their place."
They have every reason to be. From the rejection of the EU constitution to mass rioting and protests, the French are in an unforgiving mood as they prepare for a presidential election in just over a year. They are fed up with the male-dominated elite, the familiar cast of politicians, from the outgoing centre-right President Jacques Chirac to the wrinkly Socialist luminary Jack Lang – the former minister with the all-year tan – who have dominated the political landscape for more than two decades. Could the time have come for an unorthodox female leader in a country that has never before had a woman as head of state?
Perhaps. France might have some of the world’s most dynamic companies, but it is in dreadful shape. The economy grew by a mere 1.4% in 2005, and wealth per person has been overtaken by Britain’s and Ireland’s. While many of the brightest emigrate in search of better job opportunities – London is one of the favourite destinations – the state is piling up debt to support the rising health and retirement costs of an ageing population and mass unemployment: almost a quarter of potential workers under 26 are on the dole, compared with 13% in Britain. And as public debt increases, France’s shrinking population currently works shorter hours than those in most advanced countries. Something has to give.
According to Michel Pébereau, chairman of the BNP Paribas bank, debt could soar from the current 65% to 100% of GDP by 2014, resulting in a "foreseeable reduction of our capacity to create jobs and wealth". Or as François Bayrou, a centre-right politician, put it, "If it [France] were a company, it would already have been declared bankrupt. If it were a family, the bailiffs would be banging at the door."
He believes part of the problem is that France has never been properly "déMarxisé": a recent opinion poll found that 66% of the British agree that the free market is the best available system, but the number is only 36% in France, one of the few countries left in the world where the Communist party is still respected.
The strong dirigiste state is virtually a religion, and more than one quarter of all jobs are still in the public sector. Suspicion of money and profit runs deep. Even supposedly Conservative politicians such as Chirac see Britain’s economic model as "free-market misery". Efforts at even modest reform have repeatedly foundered on fears that the "French way" is under attack and that the country’s soul will be drowned in the torrent of globalisation. In this climate, can any leader find a new way forward to deliver France from the crisis?
Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy, the interior minister who is her most likely rival in an election, believe they can. Both are politicians outside the usual mould. This could make them the protagonists in one of the most significant contests of modern French history: "Ségo vs Sarko". Both are in their early fifties – extraordinarily young for French presidential candidates – and both are at odds with their parties, a detail that complicates life considerably for Royal, considering that she lives with François Hollande, the Socialist leader.
She has always had an unconventional streak, and has lived with Hollande for three decades without marrying him. They met at the Ecole National d’Administration, or ENA, a nursery for the ruling elite. Though she shares the same technocratic background as the older generation of politicians, her respect for the way Tony Blair modernised his party puts her at odds with their conventional wisdom. She has praised the "flexibility" with which he brought down unemployment, and disdains the Anglophobia so common these days in her own party. "I hate the way he has been demonised over here," she says. In addition, in a country hardly known for its puritanical streak, her social conservatism has also made her controversial. Her opposition to single-sex families, which has alienated the gay vote, goes against party orthodoxy, as does her recent campaign against advertisements for thong underwear. She has carved out her own niche in economic matters too. Unlike other socialists, she has criticised the wastefulness of the 35-hour week and denounced the "squandering" of public money.
Sarkozy, for his part, has already changed French politics with the introduction of what are widely derided as "Anglo-Saxon" policies such as "zero-tolerance policing" and "American-style" campaigning techniques. The son of a Hungarian immigrant, he can delight in not being an énarque, as they refer to graduates from ENA. "I am for the total reconstruction of France," he says, advocating what he calls a complete "rupture" with the past.
This will not be easy, however, judging by the experiences of Dominique de Villepin, the prime minister vying with Sarkozy for the centre-right presidential nomination. De Villepin’s attempt to inject a bit more flexibility into the rigid labour market hardly amounts to Sarkozy’s bold "rupture", but even this bit of tinkering recently brought the country to a standstill in a series of demonstrations and strikes. The contrat première embauche (CPE), or first employment contract, was an attempt to encourage employers to take on more young workers by giving them the power to sack them without notice if they had been employed for under two years. In so doing, he united both those young French people who were opposed to change and wanted the state to guarantee them a future, and those youngsters from the ghettos who felt excluded at a much deeper level. This failure to convince the very people who might benefit from such a law rules out any more serious reforming before the elections, and might even conspire against a reform package being introduced after the vote. De Villepin may be to blame for botching a long-overdue rendezvous with renewal. How could he have got it so wrong?
The answer may lie in observing France’s prime minister at work and play. He epitomises an elite removed from the everyday lives of his own citizens. In February this year, I travelled with him on an official visit to Moscow to meet Vladimir Putin. The temperature outside was -12C, and though it was only 10am, inside the French Embassy servants were handing around glasses of vodka to ward off the cold. De Villepin, a tall, silver-haired figure, was locked in animated conversation with Sergei Ivanov, the Russian defence minister. They were talking in Spanish, one of the languages they have in common. De Villepin did not let slip any opportunity to flaunt his linguistic skills – and general brilliance. Even recent events may fail to dent his astounding confidence. He has written books – about history, mainly – and poetry. He has a beautiful wife and two children: a son named Arthur, after Rimbaud, the poet, and a daughter who has modelled for Elle. Admirers claim he is irresistible to women. From this lofty height, he is said to look down his nose at members of parliament – the prime minister calls them "connards", or arseholes – preferring the company of writers and intellectuals. Put a curly wig on him and de Villepin would no doubt feel at home in an 18th-century Parisian salon. A career diplomat, he graduated from the ENA in the same year as Royal but, unlike her, has never been elected to public office.
This does not stop him dreaming of glory, and he is prepared to take the daftest risks to achieve it. As foreign minister, he sent a team of French secret agents to rescue his former pupil Ingrid Betancourt, a Colombian presidential candidate, from Marxist rebels in the jungle. The idea was to fly her back to Paris in time for the quatorze juillet (July 14) celebrations. De Villepin would be hailed as a hero. However, when the rescuers landed in Brazil in their unmarked French military aircraft laden with guns and cash, they were arrested by police on suspicion of drug-trafficking. The unfortunate Betancourt is still in captivity.
This in no way dampened de Villepin’s appetite for risk-taking. His posturing and puffed-up sense of mission make him an embodiment of some of the most irritating – and, to some, endearing – aspects of French national character. "It is a heavy burden, being prime minister," he acknowledged during his visit to the French embassy in Moscow. "There are so many things to be concerned about."
When he was appointed in June last year, de Villepin made reducing unemployment levels his priority. Laudable enough. Comparing himself perhaps to Napoleon, his hero, on the eve of his finest victory at Austerlitz, the prime minister has been talking ever since in military metaphors to signal his commitment to the battle. "We will be fighting on every front," he has said. One of his first steps was to draw up the law that has united France in protest. It was rushed through parliament by decree in February, but nonetheless, as he travelled to Moscow, de Villepin was in a buoyant mood.
On his plane, unaware of what was still to come, the tall, patrician prime minister joked with aides about how small Nicolas Sarkozy is. He pointed out that France has never had a short president. De Villepin has loathed the interior minister ever since the 1995 election, when Sarkozy betrayed Chirac by siding with his rival, Edouard Balladur.
One of his cruellest jibes is to describe his diminutive opponent as the "hooker" in a game of rugby, who does all the work, getting the ball out of the scrum, only to see it passed onto a taller, faster figure who comes running out of nowhere to score the try. No points for guessing who that is. As he greeted Russian businessmen at a dinner at the start of his Moscow visit on the evening of February 13, Russian words tripped off his tongue and, as a band struck up the Marseillaise that evening, he might have imagined himself already in the presidential Elysée Palace: his guests that evening awarded him a bust, cast in bronze, of himself.
Forces beyond his control were conspiring against his dream of glory, however. Instead of Austerlitz, the battle was beginning to look more like de Villepin’s Waterloo.
As he strutted about in Moscow, the aircraft carrier Clemenceau was rumbling across the Indian Ocean. She was supposed to have been dismantled in an Indian port. Then Greenpeace complained about her dumping asbestos on the Third World, and Chirac ordered the ship home. France, for once, would have to deal with her own toxic waste. There could hardly be a better symbol of the country’s decrepitude and lack of direction and, for a proud French public, the spectacle of this naval relic and symbol of past glories being treated with such lèse-majesté was deeply unpleasant. De Villepin’s approval rating began to fall.
Further humiliation followed. Within a month of his return from Moscow, the student protests began in earnest. Again and again, millions have taken to the streets to vent their fury against the "Kleenex job contract" that would make workers as expendable as tissue paper. The battle of the employment law, with three-quarters of French youth saying they wanted civil-service jobs and not the risks of the open market – was the latest in a string of calamities that started when voters turned down the proposed EU constitution in May last year, in a humiliating referendum result for Chirac, who had argued it was France’s best defence against what he called the "new communism" – the liberal economic savagery practised by Britain.
Barely a month later came the news that London, not Paris, had been awarded the 2012 Olympics. Then, no sooner had Chirac recovered from a stroke than rioting broke out in the immigrant suburbs, in which 10,000 cars and 200 buildings were burnt; an orgy of destruction that focused global attention on the racial malaise in Europe’s heart.
It was these pockets of want in the banlieues, literally "places of banishment", that de Villepin was trying to help with his employment law. To some, however, it was akin to putting a plaster onto a wooden leg, a futile exercise demonstrating the extent to which de Villepin was a symptom of France’s problems – not a solution.
So much for de Villepin. But what of the other potential French presidents? Ségolène Royal, though she has been part of the political scenery for at least two decades, has the advantage of somehow appearing fresh. Her glossy hair, blue eyes and blinding white teeth make her look more like a glamorous television anchorwoman than a politician.
And her sense of style adds to the clichéd fantasy of the French woman able to manage the double burden of career and children while enjoying her cheese and wine without putting on weight.
"It has not always been easy," she told me when we met over lunch in Poitiers, the capital of the Poitou-Charentes region, her fiefdom. Her youngest daughter, 14-year-old Flora, she said, was "stressed out" by all the attention being heaped on the Royal family. This was not just because of the army of cameramen and journalists who follow Ségo wherever she goes.
Hollande, her partner, had been dreaming about being a candidate in the elections long before he realised – reluctantly – that the mother of his children stood a better chance: opinion polls have put her streets ahead of "Monsieur Royal", as his enemies call him. "Doubtless the French are thirsty for novelty," was how a tetchy Hollande described the appeal of his partner.
One can only wonder what effect all this has had on the home life of France’s star political couple. Whether or not Hollande ends up endorsing the mother of his children, there is no shortage of other party barons who believe they are more entitled than her to represent the left at the next election, among them such has-beens as Lionel Jospin, the former Trotskyist schoolteacher and prime minister who was supposed to have retired from politics after his humiliating defeat in the last presidential election in 2002.
Even more outraged by Royal’s entry into the ring was Laurent Fabius, the balding former prime minister who has been cogitating since childhood on how to win the presidency. After being told the news, he snidely asked: "Who is going to look after the children?" He may come to regret that remark. "It was hurtful and humiliating," said Royal.
Royal has had her revenge, however, robbing other would-be Socialist presidential contenders of the media limelight they so crave. She was followed, like a movie star, around the Paris agricultural show by a cortege of photographers on February 28, while a bewildered-looking Lang was seen wandering about by himself. For Royal, the show, a highlight of the political calendar, was an important test: how would she fare in this mucky, male-dominated milieu?
Kitted out that day in what looked suspiciously like a designer safari suit, Royal took to chatting with farmers and breeders with a nonchalant ease that would have impressed even Chirac, a veteran and master of the event who happily munches his way around all the stalls, sampling as much sausage, cheese and meat as is handed to him.
One man in particular will remember Royal’s visit. Jean-Michel Lemétayer, the president of a powerful agricultural union, returned from a hearty lunch to find Royal in front of his stand. In private, Royal had criticised Lemétayer for not being aggressive enough in seeking compensation from the government for chicken farmers affected by bird flu. Now she let him have it. "There are farmers’ families who cannot make ends meet and who need aid," she said. "Get angry!" she snapped. So much for the soft voice.
One of eight children of a strict French army colonel, she developed a reputation for radicalism at ENA that earned her the nickname "the barefoot énarque" – a reaction, perhaps, against the views of an extremely conservative father. She came under the guidance of François Mitterrand, the last Socialist president, who steered her into a series of increasingly important jobs in the education and health ministries – although apparently not, as rumour would have it, into his bed. Her stands against television violence, pornography and teenage pregnancy brought her into the limelight, winning her a following among women voters.
After the death of Mitterrand in 1996 she faded from view but, in regional elections two years ago, she erupted again onto the stage with a stunning conquest of the presidency of Poitou-Charentes, a region she has made the springboard for her presidential ambitions.
The realisation that Royal is for real has finally dawned on Sarkozy as well. On January 19, he was on a flight to Le Havre when an aide pointed to a picture of him surrounded by 18 men in dark suits – his entourage at the interior ministry. Only one woman was partially visible in the picture. He was furious and got on the phone to his office. "Why hasn’t Roselyne been appointed yet?" he asked, referring to Roselyne Bachelot, the Euro MP he had selected for a senior post on the executive council of the Union for a Popular Movement party (UMP), of which he is president. He was told about some procedural hitch. "I don’t give a damn," he shrieked.
Sarkozy, 51, has every reason to feel vulnerable when it comes to the female vote. Last year, Cecilia, his wife and chief adviser, left him for another man, complaining that he had treated her like "furniture". He was livid. Cecilia had been one of his chief political props. In a strategy that revolutionised the political landscape in a country whose leaders had always zealously guarded their privacy, he was always happy to parade his family in front of the cameras.
The glamorous power couple were often seen cycling together. Even their son, Louis, had an unwitting role in this Gallic version of Camelot: if Sarkozy, in a meeting in his office, wanted to impress upon a visitor his human side, he would get an aide to roll a ball through the door. Little Louis would run after it into the office to his adoring papa.
This approach ended up backfiring on him when the French press, habitually hesitant about intruding into the private lives of politicians, began covering the break-up of his relationship in lurid detail, citing the important role that Cecilia had played in his entourage. Sarkozy was furious, but not inconsolable. It emerged that he too was seeing somebody else – a young political journalist.
In January he persuaded Cecilia to return to him from New York, where she had moved in with Richard Attias, a well-connected ad man. By February, though, the relationship was once again on the rocks and the couple had a blazing row in Sarkozy’s interior-ministry office on March 1. The next day, Cecilia left for New York.
On International Women’s Day, Sarkozy announced that he was setting up a website for women. By then, Bachelot had been installed as the UMP’s secretary-general. He gave another signal of his interest in promoting women by supporting the party’s selection of Françoise de Panafieu, a Conservative MP and former minister, as a candidate for mayor of Paris.
When it comes to the female vote, however, Sarkozy can hardly compete with Royal. In a country where women’s wages are notoriously lower than men’s, young, working women, according to one pollster, see Ségo as a "career weapon" whose success in politics will help them "personally to progress in their companies". For many women, no doubt, she also represents revenge on the ambient machismo exemplified by Chirac’s outburst at a European summit with Margaret Thatcher in 1988: "What does she want, this housewife – my balls on a tray?"
Things have been complicated in other ways, too, for Sarkozy. Even before the latest unrest, he was struggling to escape being too closely identified with the failings of the regime – a difficult manoeuvre, considering that he is such a prominent member of the government. Much as he approved of de Villepin’s employment law, it was not the radical overhaul that he believes the labour market needs, and the watered-down version that went into effect after Chirac’s intervention did not seem to merit such popular uproar. It did, however, afford him the chance of grabbing centre stage in finding a compromise between students and union leaders. But it did not bode well for what economists such as Nicolas Baverez, the author of France in Freefall, believe are the minimum reforms necessary to halt the decline: abolition of the 35-hour week, deregulation of the labour market, the reduction of government and the streamlining of health and other public services.
By contrast, the employment row has done no harm to Royal. Unlike some of the other socialist heavyweights, she declined to take part in any of the protests but made a point of announcing that she would not recognise the first employment contract in her region. At the same time, she made clear in an interview that she was not against loosening the labour code but opposed the way de Villepin had rammed his law through parliament without consultation – an example, she said, of "stupidity" that had resulted in "a general mess". To say any more at this stage could undermine her long-term position. Until her nomination is secure, she is likely to keep quiet. Quite where the Socialists intend to lead the people is unclear: their policies won’t be unveiled until the publication of their manifesto later this year.
It is difficult to be optimistic about France’s future, particularly when hearing what Jacques Godfrain, a Conservative MP, had to say when he emerged from a lunch with Chirac and his ministers in February. "There was a strong sense of agreement to the effect that France is ungovernable. But that she likes being governed." Others saw greater wisdom in General Charles de Gaulle. "Mayhem, that’s the sickness of the French," he once said. "I don’t think we will ever cure them of it." It is hard to imagine, sometimes, why anyone would try.
Candidate: Segolene Royal
The star of the opinion polls is an unorthodox Socialist contender because of her support for Tony Blair and her opposition to the 35-hour week. Although she served under the former Socialist President Mitterrand, she manages to seem fresh; and her campaigns against child pornography and conjugal violence have won her a following among women voters, which she is using, despite opposition from ‘dinosaurs’ within her own party, as a springboard for her presidential ambitions.
Chances of being elected: good
Candidate: Nicolas Sarkozy
The most likely standard-bearer for the centre-right, Sarkozy advocates ‘reconstruction’ and ‘rupture’ with the past. He would deregulate the labour code, streamline health and other public services and reduce the size of the government. As the interior minister, he has courted votes with his tough talk on crime and immigration.
Chances of being elected: good
Candidate: Dominique de Villepin
A protege of Jacques Chirac, he represents a discredited system. Despite a disastrous effort to soften the rigid labour code, he has vowed to protect the French social model against the ‘Anglo-Saxon’ free-market impulse. A believer in restoring France’s lost glory, he thinks destiny has selected him as his country’s saviour.
Chances of being elected: poor
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2099-2121725_1,00.html
Are they crazy ???
<font size="4"><center>French presidential hopeful voted <u>sixth sexiest woman</u></font size></center>
Telegraph
By Henry Samuel in Paris
(Filed: 12/06/2006)
Ségolène Royal, the French Left's main presidential candidate, has been elected the world's sixth sexiest woman, beating scores of international sex symbols including Jennifer Lopez, Elizabeth Hurley and Penelope Cruz.
The surprise victory in a survey on the "100 sexiest women in the world, 2006" for the French edition of the men's monthly magazine FHM, is being hailed as a boost to Miss Royal's chances of winning the French presidential elections next year.
The 52-year-old mother of four left Penelope Cruz (15th), Jennifer Lopez (34th), Liz Hurley (41st) and Italian film star Monica Bellucci (91st) trailing, and was only two places behind the American actress Angelina Jolie.
Top of the poll was Adriana Karembeu, the French-Slovak supermodel and wife of former international French footballer, Christian Karembeu.
((I'm joining the conspiracist; not a gotdam Black woman in any of the polls? Got to be a conspiracy.)) Qx
Miss Royal, the partner of, François Hollande, the Socialist party leader, has taken the French political world by storm since the beginning of the year, going from a relative unknown to the current favourite in next year's presidential elections, even garnering more support than Nicolas Sarkozy, the Right's front-runner. She can now claim to be the first politician to have featured on FHM's annual list.
Scarlett Johanssen topped the US version of the poll, with Angelina Jolie placed second. The British list was published in March. Keira Knightley came top.
Part of Royal's success, suggested Le Parisien, which leaked details of the poll, conducted by the CSA polling institute, is down to a Hillary Clinton-style overhaul she has undergone in recent years, going from bespectacled academic to glossy-haired presidential contender.
Last year she had an upper tooth straightened, prompting the newspaper Libération to jest: "The French people's favourite Socialist is now endowed with an American smile."
"She plays on her beauty," Georges Chetochine, a sociologist told the paper. "She wears light clothes - never dark. Her well studied make-up is pale as well, in order to light up her face. She wears dresses not trousers and has a young hairstyle: how would you know she was over 50?" She has also worked on her voice, scrapping a high, aggressive timbre for sultry, lower tones.
Miss Royal, the president of the Poitou-Charent region, will no doubt value her ranking more than Jacques Chirac, who was recently awarded FHM's "Most Corrupt Man in the West" prize.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...y12.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/06/12/ixuknews.html
2nd night of violence in Paris suburb
By Ariane Bernard Published: November 26, 2007
VILLIERS-LE-BEL, France: Dozens of youths clashed with the police for the second night in a row in a disadvantaged suburb north of Paris, throwing stones, glass and firebombs against large contingents of heavily-armed riot police officers and moving nimbly from target to target on several fronts, torching cars and a garbage truck.
The clashes began when two teenagers traveling on a motorbike died in a collision with a police car Sunday afternoon in the town of Villiers-le-Bel, about 12 miles north of Paris, in the Val d'Oise department. President Nicolas Sarkozy, in China on Monday on an official visit, appealed for calm.
Over a hundred youths had pushed riot police officers into the middle of a four-way intersection, raining projectiles on them from at least two directions. Police officers replied with tear gas and paint guns to mark the attackers for future arrest. Broken glass and used tear-gas canisters littered the road.
At least one police officer was wounded, and law enforcement officials at the scene were talking of an attacker using a shotgun on them. Within sight of the intersection, a garbage truck was on fire, apparently unattended as youths were lined up behind the truck.
At least 15 cars were burned down, with the police guarding the local fire department and moving in with them to protect firefighters as they put out fires. At least three buildings suffered some fire damage, including a library and a post office, a spokesman for the police in Val d'Oise said. Many of the youths had clearly planned their attack, having lined up garbage cans in the middle of the street.
A later investigation found that police officers indeed chased the two youths on foot, though not as far as the power station. That incident led to the three-week civil unrest which eventually spread to many urban areas in France. Thousands of cars were burned and dozens of public buildings were set on fire. In the early evening of Monday, before the violence began in earnest, a group of mothers and girls were gathered at the foot of a building, watching a column of riot police officers nearby.
"They say it's an accident, but for me it's not an accident," said Jennifer Vandelannoitte, 22, who is unemployed. "Me, I'm telling you, they're going to pay. Really, it's not good." "No, it's not normal," said one of the mothers. "The youths, they are already full of hatred. I know it's not the solution to burn everything down, of course." The police authority for the Val d'Oise area described the accident on Sunday as a rather ordinary crash at an intersection.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/26/europe/france.php?WT.mc_id=rssfrontpage
By Ariane Bernard Published: November 26, 2007
VILLIERS-LE-BEL, France: Dozens of youths clashed with the police for the second night in a row in a disadvantaged suburb north of Paris, throwing stones, glass and firebombs against large contingents of heavily-armed riot police officers and moving nimbly from target to target on several fronts, torching cars and a garbage truck.
The clashes began when two teenagers traveling on a motorbike died in a collision with a police car Sunday afternoon in the town of Villiers-le-Bel, about 12 miles north of Paris, in the Val d'Oise department. President Nicolas Sarkozy, in China on Monday on an official visit, appealed for calm.
Over a hundred youths had pushed riot police officers into the middle of a four-way intersection, raining projectiles on them from at least two directions. Police officers replied with tear gas and paint guns to mark the attackers for future arrest. Broken glass and used tear-gas canisters littered the road.
At least one police officer was wounded, and law enforcement officials at the scene were talking of an attacker using a shotgun on them. Within sight of the intersection, a garbage truck was on fire, apparently unattended as youths were lined up behind the truck.
At least 15 cars were burned down, with the police guarding the local fire department and moving in with them to protect firefighters as they put out fires. At least three buildings suffered some fire damage, including a library and a post office, a spokesman for the police in Val d'Oise said. Many of the youths had clearly planned their attack, having lined up garbage cans in the middle of the street.
A later investigation found that police officers indeed chased the two youths on foot, though not as far as the power station. That incident led to the three-week civil unrest which eventually spread to many urban areas in France. Thousands of cars were burned and dozens of public buildings were set on fire. In the early evening of Monday, before the violence began in earnest, a group of mothers and girls were gathered at the foot of a building, watching a column of riot police officers nearby.
"They say it's an accident, but for me it's not an accident," said Jennifer Vandelannoitte, 22, who is unemployed. "Me, I'm telling you, they're going to pay. Really, it's not good." "No, it's not normal," said one of the mothers. "The youths, they are already full of hatred. I know it's not the solution to burn everything down, of course." The police authority for the Val d'Oise area described the accident on Sunday as a rather ordinary crash at an intersection.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/26/europe/france.php?WT.mc_id=rssfrontpage
Sarkozy labels Paris-area riots as ‘unacceptable’
Guns add dangerous twist to unrest
French riot police check notes using flashlights as they patrol
in Villiers-le-Bel, a northern Paris suburb, on Tuesday evening.
Wed., Nov. 28, 2007
PARIS - French President Nicolas Sarkozy insisted Wednesday that rioters who shot at police would be brought to justice and called the violence that has raged for three nights in a Paris suburb unacceptable.
"So that things are very clear: What has happened is absolutely unacceptable," Sarkozy, said after meeting with a wounded police captain hospitalized in Eaubonne north of Paris.
It was the first time Sarkozy, who had just returned from China, had entered the fray of the renewed tensions in France's suburbs since the rioting broke out Sunday night.
The violence drew comparisons with riots that raged through suburbs nationwide in 2005, and shows that that anger still smolders in poor housing projects where many Arabs, blacks and other minorities live largely isolated from the rest of society.
The renewed outburst was shaping up to be a stern test for Sarkozy.
"We will find the shooters," he said, and they will "be brought to account before justice."
He described the incident that sparked the violence — the death of two teens on a motorbike Sunday in an accident with a police car in the Paris suburb of Villiers-le-Bel — as "distressing." But he added: "Shooting at police has no link to this incident."
Sarkozy was meeting Wednesday morning with the families of the two teens, and with the mayor of Villiers-le-Bel before having a security meeting with his top ministers.
Less intense violence
While cars were set ablaze for a third night Tuesday, officials said the violence was less intense than the two previous nights.
Interior Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said the overall situation was "calm." Still, she said on Europe-1 radio, police presence would remain reinforced "as long as necessary."
She said 39 people were arrested in the Paris region Tuesday night.
Bands of young people set more cars on fire Tuesday in and around Villiers-le-Bel. In the southern city of Toulouse, 20 cars were set ablaze, and fires at two libraries were quickly brought under control, police said.
The previous night, 82 officers were injured, 10 of them by buckshot and pellets, the police force said. The use of firearms — rare in 2005 — added a dangerous dimension.
Chronic woes in depressed suburbs
There have long been tensions between France's largely white police force and ethnic minorities trapped in poor neighborhoods.
Despite decades of problems and heavy state investments to improve housing and create jobs, the depressed projects that ring Paris are a world apart from the tourist attractions of the French capital.
Police speak of no-go zones where they and firefighters fear to patrol.
The violence two years ago also started in the suburbs of northern Paris, when two teens were electrocuted in a power substation while hiding from police.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21978411/
In France, ‘a bomb waiting for the match’
Immigrant, minority youths riot near Paris
Some 500 people pay tribute in Villiers le Bel, France,
on Tuesday, to the two teenagers who died when
their motorcycle crashed against a police car. The
youngsters deaths sparkled riots.
By John Ward Anderson
Washington Post
updated 12:34 a.m. CT, Wed., Nov. 28, 2007
VILLIERS-LE-BEL, France - On the morning after a mob of angry youths torched the library in this small, immigrant-heavy town north of Paris during a second night of rioting, a group of local leaders stood outside the charred remains Tuesday and tried to make sense of what they saw.
"This was a symbol -- it's the Republic, the state, and so they threw molotov cocktails at city hall" and other government buildings, said Raymonde Le Texier, a Socialist senator who was mayor of Villiers-le-Bel for a decade. "People feel forgotten by the government powers, and it's the truth -- they have been forgotten by those in power."
Added town council member Serge Lotterie, 63, a retired postal worker also from the Socialist Party, "This has been a bomb waiting for the match to strike."
"These guys have nothing," he said of youths who went on a rampage after two teenagers were killed Sunday night when the motorbike they were riding collided with a police cruiser. "They stand in the streets at night with their hoods up and wait for things to happen, and so they close in on themselves and forget about integration."
Whether the violence in Villiers-le-Bel, seven miles north of Paris, will burn itself out or continue spreading to other minority and immigrant communities across Paris and France, as it did in 2005, has much of the country on edge.
Tuesday night, a police presence that French radio estimated at more than 600 officers was trying to maintain calm in Villiers-le-Bel, but scattered violence was reported and the regional government said 22 youths were detained. There were reports of unrest elsewhere, including car fires and a library burning in the southern city of Toulouse.
Two years ago, more than 8,000 cars were burned and 2,900 people arrested in three weeks of rioting that started after two minority teenagers were killed while fleeing police in Clichy-sous-Bois, a Paris suburb 10 miles southeast of Villiers-le-Bel; they were electrocuted after scrambling into a power substation.
‘Scum’ comment - Minorities and Immigrants
People here and around the world took the 2005 riots as serving notice that minority and immigrant communities in France felt increasingly angry over discrimination, poor housing and few job opportunities. Nicolas Sarkozy, who was then interior minister and is now France's president, was widely blamed for fueling the violence by publicly calling young rioters "scum." He subsequently promised a grand development plan for the suburbs to create dramatic improvements in employment, education and social programs.
The town has recently built a few new roads and added some park benches. There are three new community centers. The destroyed Louis Jouvet Library had recently added CD and DVD collections, now buried in blackened debris.
But residents say they have yet to see real improvements in the things that really matter, such as job training and other programs for youths.
"They say a lot is done, but in reality nothing is done," said Charlie Koissi, 31, a pharmaceutical assistant at a Paris research foundation who also works part time as a youth counselor and martial arts instructor in Villiers-le-Bel. He was born in France of parents from Ivory Coast.
"The young guys who live here have no future," said Lotterie, the town council member. "If you want to work in Charles de Gaulle" -- the nearby international airport -- "and if you're from Villiers-le-Bel, you're black and your name is Mohammed, there's no chance."
The town of 27,000 residents has 50 ethnic and religious groups and an unemployment rate of about 40 percent, he said. "Everyone says everything is possible, but not for these guys."
Many of the apartment houses have absentee owners who are renting each unit to as many as four families, Lotterie said. "Some rent out their kitchens, so you can imagine how people live there."
"I was sad" about the violence, said a local 12-year-old, Mathew, who recounted hearing explosions and going to the library, where he sometimes did homework, while it was still ablaze. "My parents weren't sad -- they were a little shocked," he added, saying there was nothing for him to do at home. "Now they won't know what to do with me."
In the area around the library, the streets were littered Tuesday with shattered glass, crumbled rock and other debris left from Monday's clashes between police and youths. A few youths walked around the library Tuesday, occasionally throwing rocks at outsiders.
Shop windows in some parts of town were smashed; burned-out vehicles were scattered along roadsides.
Many white residents of the town appeared to be taking the violence with a sense of resignation. G¿rard Jean, a town firefighter who was comforting a friend inside her ransacked beauty salon, said getting angry wouldn't help. "I feel sorry. If we get angry, we'll be like the kids in the street."
‘Died for nothing’
Photocopied pictures of the two dead youths were taped on many shop windows, street signs and doorways. "We love you," said a note under the picture of Larami Samoura, 16. On the picture of Moushin Souhelli, 15, was written: "Deceased 25/11/07. Died for nothing."
The deaths are under investigation. Police said the youths were riding an unregistered motorbike, without helmets, and crashed into the police car at high speed. Some residents and relatives of the youths said police left the scene too quickly and failed to help the injured teenagers.
Patrice Ribeiro, deputy general secretary of Synergie, the police union, said in a telephone interview that the two officers in the car had to leave the scene "as soon as possible" because "groups of guys ran towards the police car and wanted to lynch" them.
More than 100 police officers were injured -- five seriously -- in pitched street fights here and in five other communities north of Paris on Sunday and Monday nights, Ribeiro said.
About 80 cars were set afire Monday night, he said.
"There were rifle shots the first evening of violence," and Monday night "was worse," he said. "We're witnessing a climate of insurrection. We're now dealing with urban guerrillas, with people hiding in groups, throwing projectiles when night falls."
Prime Minister Fran¿ois Fillon and Interior Minister Mich¿le Alliot-Marie toured the town Tuesday. "Those who shoot at police are criminals, and they will be pursued as such," Fillon told reporters.
Sarkozy, who is in China, was to return to France on Wednesday and hold security meetings in the morning, his office said.
"The kids have one frozen idea about the police. The police are just the devil, and there's no solution," said Pierre Tap¿, pastor at a local Baptist church who moved to the town from Ivory Coast six years ago. On the other hand, when police see the young people, they see only black and immigrant youths, even though many are French, he said. "The responsibility for the situation has to be shared. The kids are at fault, and so are the police."
Correspondent Molly Moore and researcher Corinne Gavard in Paris contributed to this report.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22001110/
Immigrant, minority youths riot near Paris
Some 500 people pay tribute in Villiers le Bel, France,
on Tuesday, to the two teenagers who died when
their motorcycle crashed against a police car. The
youngsters deaths sparkled riots.
By John Ward Anderson
Washington Post
updated 12:34 a.m. CT, Wed., Nov. 28, 2007
VILLIERS-LE-BEL, France - On the morning after a mob of angry youths torched the library in this small, immigrant-heavy town north of Paris during a second night of rioting, a group of local leaders stood outside the charred remains Tuesday and tried to make sense of what they saw.
"This was a symbol -- it's the Republic, the state, and so they threw molotov cocktails at city hall" and other government buildings, said Raymonde Le Texier, a Socialist senator who was mayor of Villiers-le-Bel for a decade. "People feel forgotten by the government powers, and it's the truth -- they have been forgotten by those in power."
Added town council member Serge Lotterie, 63, a retired postal worker also from the Socialist Party, "This has been a bomb waiting for the match to strike."
"These guys have nothing," he said of youths who went on a rampage after two teenagers were killed Sunday night when the motorbike they were riding collided with a police cruiser. "They stand in the streets at night with their hoods up and wait for things to happen, and so they close in on themselves and forget about integration."
Whether the violence in Villiers-le-Bel, seven miles north of Paris, will burn itself out or continue spreading to other minority and immigrant communities across Paris and France, as it did in 2005, has much of the country on edge.
Tuesday night, a police presence that French radio estimated at more than 600 officers was trying to maintain calm in Villiers-le-Bel, but scattered violence was reported and the regional government said 22 youths were detained. There were reports of unrest elsewhere, including car fires and a library burning in the southern city of Toulouse.
Two years ago, more than 8,000 cars were burned and 2,900 people arrested in three weeks of rioting that started after two minority teenagers were killed while fleeing police in Clichy-sous-Bois, a Paris suburb 10 miles southeast of Villiers-le-Bel; they were electrocuted after scrambling into a power substation.
‘Scum’ comment - Minorities and Immigrants
People here and around the world took the 2005 riots as serving notice that minority and immigrant communities in France felt increasingly angry over discrimination, poor housing and few job opportunities. Nicolas Sarkozy, who was then interior minister and is now France's president, was widely blamed for fueling the violence by publicly calling young rioters "scum." He subsequently promised a grand development plan for the suburbs to create dramatic improvements in employment, education and social programs.
The town has recently built a few new roads and added some park benches. There are three new community centers. The destroyed Louis Jouvet Library had recently added CD and DVD collections, now buried in blackened debris.
But residents say they have yet to see real improvements in the things that really matter, such as job training and other programs for youths.
"They say a lot is done, but in reality nothing is done," said Charlie Koissi, 31, a pharmaceutical assistant at a Paris research foundation who also works part time as a youth counselor and martial arts instructor in Villiers-le-Bel. He was born in France of parents from Ivory Coast.
"The young guys who live here have no future," said Lotterie, the town council member. "If you want to work in Charles de Gaulle" -- the nearby international airport -- "and if you're from Villiers-le-Bel, you're black and your name is Mohammed, there's no chance."
The town of 27,000 residents has 50 ethnic and religious groups and an unemployment rate of about 40 percent, he said. "Everyone says everything is possible, but not for these guys."
Many of the apartment houses have absentee owners who are renting each unit to as many as four families, Lotterie said. "Some rent out their kitchens, so you can imagine how people live there."
"I was sad" about the violence, said a local 12-year-old, Mathew, who recounted hearing explosions and going to the library, where he sometimes did homework, while it was still ablaze. "My parents weren't sad -- they were a little shocked," he added, saying there was nothing for him to do at home. "Now they won't know what to do with me."
In the area around the library, the streets were littered Tuesday with shattered glass, crumbled rock and other debris left from Monday's clashes between police and youths. A few youths walked around the library Tuesday, occasionally throwing rocks at outsiders.
Shop windows in some parts of town were smashed; burned-out vehicles were scattered along roadsides.
Many white residents of the town appeared to be taking the violence with a sense of resignation. G¿rard Jean, a town firefighter who was comforting a friend inside her ransacked beauty salon, said getting angry wouldn't help. "I feel sorry. If we get angry, we'll be like the kids in the street."
‘Died for nothing’
Photocopied pictures of the two dead youths were taped on many shop windows, street signs and doorways. "We love you," said a note under the picture of Larami Samoura, 16. On the picture of Moushin Souhelli, 15, was written: "Deceased 25/11/07. Died for nothing."
The deaths are under investigation. Police said the youths were riding an unregistered motorbike, without helmets, and crashed into the police car at high speed. Some residents and relatives of the youths said police left the scene too quickly and failed to help the injured teenagers.
Patrice Ribeiro, deputy general secretary of Synergie, the police union, said in a telephone interview that the two officers in the car had to leave the scene "as soon as possible" because "groups of guys ran towards the police car and wanted to lynch" them.
More than 100 police officers were injured -- five seriously -- in pitched street fights here and in five other communities north of Paris on Sunday and Monday nights, Ribeiro said.
About 80 cars were set afire Monday night, he said.
"There were rifle shots the first evening of violence," and Monday night "was worse," he said. "We're witnessing a climate of insurrection. We're now dealing with urban guerrillas, with people hiding in groups, throwing projectiles when night falls."
Prime Minister Fran¿ois Fillon and Interior Minister Mich¿le Alliot-Marie toured the town Tuesday. "Those who shoot at police are criminals, and they will be pursued as such," Fillon told reporters.
Sarkozy, who is in China, was to return to France on Wednesday and hold security meetings in the morning, his office said.
"The kids have one frozen idea about the police. The police are just the devil, and there's no solution," said Pierre Tap¿, pastor at a local Baptist church who moved to the town from Ivory Coast six years ago. On the other hand, when police see the young people, they see only black and immigrant youths, even though many are French, he said. "The responsibility for the situation has to be shared. The kids are at fault, and so are the police."
Correspondent Molly Moore and researcher Corinne Gavard in Paris contributed to this report.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22001110/