Segolene-Headlines

Le Guardian estime qu’elle est « désormais favorite pour affronter Nicolas Sarkozy l’année prochaine »... « Elle est élégante, écrit le Guardian, elle est sûre d’elle, elle est ferme sur les sujets qui l’intéressent comme la famille l’école et l’environnement, et elle est judicieusement beaucoup plus vague sur le reste sur les affaires internationales et l’économie ».

Former minister favourite to mount presidential challenge to Sarkozy

She is elegant, self-assured, strong on what interests her (families, schools, the environment), sensibly vague on the rest (foreign affairs, the economy). And according to three polls this month, she could be France's first female president. (...)

The polls look unambiguous. Surveys by Louis Harris, TNS-Sofres and Ifop show that up to 53% of the French think Ms Royal, a 52-year-old mother of four, has "the stature of a president of the Republic". In two polls her ratings pipped those of the thrusting interior minister Mr Sarkozy, and in all three she finished far ahead of veteran Socialist rivals; untainted by the row over the EU constitution last year, Ms Royal has the backing of 76% of leftist sympathisers.

(She is also benefiting from the sexism of some leading Socialists. When rumours that she might run began circulating, a former prime minister, Laurent Fabius, asked "But who will look after the children?", while a senator, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, protested that presidential campaigns were "not beauty contests".)

(...)


Her detractors, of whom there are plenty in the Socialist ranks, decry her lack of experience, and pronouncements, on the key big-picture issues. But her supporters insist the electorate can no longer be bought by empty generalisations from arrogant, ageing politicians uninterested in voters' day-to-day lives. One man is impressed. "I've always said she'd be by far the most interesting Socialist candidate, worth a dozen of all the others," Mr Sarkozy said last week. "She says a lot worth listening to. I'd welcome the chance to discuss things with her next year."

French grandees face the unthinkable: a female in charge

El Mostrador : La ''Bachelet francesa'' visitó tumba ex presidente Salvador Allende


Ségolene Royal llegó hasta el lugar acompañada de la hija del extinto mandatario, la diputada Isabel Allende.

La diputada socialista y precandidata presidencial francesa Segolene Royal visitó este martes la tumba del ex presidente Salvador Allende (1970-1973) en el cementerio General de Santiago.

Royal, en visita en Chile desde el pasado domingo para apoyar la campaña presidencial de la postulante de la Concertación, Michelle Bachelet, llegó hasta el lugar acompañada de la hija del extinto mandatario, la diputada Isabel Allende.

La aspirante presidencial francesa no quiso hacer declaraciones y se limitó a señalar que "es suficientemente simbólico el hecho de haber depositado las flores".

Isabel Allende, en tanto, agradeció la visita de Royal y de la delegación del Partido Socialista francés a la tumba de su padre.

En una conferencia de prensa antes de su visita al recinto, Royal había señalado que el triunfo de la abanderada de la Concertación, coalición que gobierna desde 1990, significaría "una profundización de una nueva etapa democrática en Chile".

Bachelet, favorita en las encuestas, enfrentará en una segunda vuelta electoral, prevista para el próximo domingo 15, al candidato derechista Sebastián Piñera.





La Nacion : Candidata presidencial francesa favorita llega a Chile para apoyar a Bachelet

La ex ministra de Francia y una de las favoritas para llegar a la presidencia de ese país, Segolene Royal, llegó hoy a Chile para apoyar la postulación de la candidata de la Concertación, Michelle Bachelet.

Royal viajó hacia Chile la noche del sábado, a pesar de que hoy se realizan las conmemoraciones del décimo aniversario de la muerte del que fuera presidente francés, Francois Mitterrand, instancia que reúne a toda la familia socialista en Jarnac, lugar donde nació y está enterrado el ex mandatario.

“Estaré en Jarnac con el corazón y el pensamiento. Pienso que Francois Mitterrand habría tomado la misma decisión” de apoyar a Bachelet “una mujer combatiente y valiente que encarna la lucha contra la dictadura en Chile”, afirmó al iniciar su viaje.

El dominical Journal du Dimanche destaca que la visita de Royal a Chile para apoyar a la candidata de la Concertación, podría ser un “viaje fundador” en la campaña que se ha acelerado en Francia, tanto en la izquierda como en la derecha, frente a las próximas elecciones presidenciales del año 2007.

De acuerdo a una encuesta reciente, Royal cuenta con un 42 por ciento de preferencia entre los franceses, lo que la convierte en la candidata del partido socialista preferida por los galos para encarar las elecciones de 2007.



Le journal argentin La Nacion annonce que la montée en popularité de Ségolène Royal confirme que « l’époque des femmes » est enfin arrivée.

Could a rising star of the French Socialist Party become the first woman president of France?
By Eric Pape
Newsweek International



"C'est qui cette fille ?" demande Newsweek.

Dans l'éventuel destin présidentiel de Ségolène Royal, le fait qu'elle soit une femme semble être un facteur qui joue autant contre elle que pour elle. Après tout, "la politique française a toujours été un monde d'hommes, et l'Elysée plus encore", observe Newsweek. Malgré cela, le magazine américain veut y croire : "Bien qu'elle ne soit pas un homme, cette version tout en élégance de la mère de famille exemplaire pourrait bien devenir la prochaine présidente française. Les Français en ont assez des hommes politiques affectant de diriger le pays selon de savantes orientations qui n'améliorent pas le quotidien des gens. Ils désirent majoritairement ce qu'ils appellent une 'cure de jouvence nationale'. Ils veulent un président honnête et comprenant leur vie quotidienne", explique Newsweek, pour qui Royal est "ce rare exemple de figure politique parisienne dotée d'un talent naturel capable de dépasser le clivage gauche-droite et de toucher le cœur des villes de province". Seulement, "nous sommes à quatorze mois de l'élection présidentielle – presque une éternité, dans un pays connu pour son climat politique capricieux".




French politics has always been a manly world, no place more so than the Elysee Palace. Almost forever, it seems, France's presidents have been cut from similar cloth, distinguished by a shared hauteur if not grandeur, self-imagined or otherwise. De Gaulle comes immediately to mind. So do Mitterrand and Chirac. Yet as the latter's star continues to wane among the French populace, a new figure has burst upon the scene. Her name: Segolene Royal. Though very much not a man, this elegant version of the sensible soccer mom could well become France's next president.


We are 14 months from France's presidential election—almost an eternity in a nation notorious for its fickle politics. But make no mistake: something is afoot in France, and it bears watching. With due caveats, you might even think of it as revolution. Consider: a disillusioned electorate, recent surveys show, is profoundly fed up with politicians who speak eloquently but say little. They are tired of leaders who affect to lead by doctoring policies that seldom improve people's lives. A large majority of the French hope for what they call national rejuvenation.

They want a new-generation president who is honest and in touch with their daily lives, not some grand international visionary. And while it might be impossible for a single person to embody all these inchoate yearnings, it's clear that these days Royal—a rising star of the French Socialist Party—comes closer than any. A Feb. 3 poll for the first time showed her defeating longtime conservative front runner Nicolas Sarkozy in a presidential runoff, 51 percent to 49 percent. (Just weeks earlier, Sarkozy was 10 points ahead.) French marketing consultant Clotaire Rappaille sums up the euphoria: "She can help France live up to its history. We need politics to advance and to be sexy again. This is the return of the great French woman!"

Never mind, again, that France hasn't had a great female leader in living memory, and perhaps not since Joan of Arc. Yet scarcely a day passes without some new sign of Royal's growing cachet. It isn't customary for politicians of any stripe to make the covers of the conservative Le Figaro, the lefty Liberation and the glossy women's magazine Elle within a matter of weeks—but last month Royal did just that. Last week the annual political Who's Who of France, Trombinoscope, named her the "political revelation of the year." Among bickering fellow Socialists, party standard-bearer Lionel Jospin comes closest to her in popularity—and he trails by 20 percentage points. As for opposition-party rivals, the anointed favorite of President Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, scores a meager 38 percent, while Chirac himself enjoys the confidence of only 21 percent of French voters.

Royal's CV offers a checklist of what France seems to want. Born in Dakar, Senegal, into a French military family, she studied at the prestigious ENA finishing school, where she met her life partner, Socialist Party chief Francois Hollande. After graduating in 1980, as the Socialists' fortunes rose, both were named as young advisers to incoming President Francois Mitterrand. Royal later served in Parliament and headed three government ministries—School Education, Environment, and Family and Childhood—tasked with the daily concerns of ordinary people. As the daughter of a military man, Royal is that rare Socialist who sounds credible when talking about law and order, while retaining the compassion of a good Socialist.

As a working mother of four in a country of working mothers, she also speaks from the heart against television violence, pornography, pedophilia and teen pregnancy. (Perhaps her most famous action as minister involved introducing day-after abortion pills into junior high and high schools.) She is that rare Parisian politician with a natural talent for crossing France's traditional left-right ideological divide and connecting to outlying cities and towns. She convincingly demonstrated the latter appeal in 2004 when she dealt a crushing blow to sitting Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin on his conservative agricultural home turf, in Poitou-Charentes, where she was elected regional president. Coming soon after the surprise election of Spanish Socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero in Spain, supporters began referring to Royal as "la Zapatera." For the Socialists, she is a surprising, even astonishing tonic. Beaten decisively by Chirac a decade ago, and again in 2002 (when even far-right fringe parties outpolled the Socialists), France's party of the left has, until Royal's rise, seemed lost in a political wilderness. But recent events have helped change the landscape. The bitter split with the United States over Iraq, rising fears of globalization, the divisive referendum on the European Union constitution and this fall's fiery race riots appear to have sparked a hunger for fresh faces, new directions and, perhaps above all, new national priorities. In contrast to the men fighting tooth and nail to succeed Chirac, Royal is the very embodiment of something new. "Mothers don't care about ideology, but they feed you," says Rappaille. "They respond to everyday needs—social protection, medical care. It's all implied."

Who's That Girl?

In a place as desperate for renewal as modern France - its voice in the world diminished, its economy depleted, its social landscape fractured by ethnic discord - the rise of Mme Royal has caused a sensation.

Although, like her rival, she has yet to declare her candidacy formally, the dark and smoky political salons of Paris were buzzing last week with excited talk of "le phénomène Sego". "If she believes she can win - and she does - she will certainly stand," said Daniel Bernard, a journalist whose sympathetic biography Madame Royal has become a runaway bestseller.

With her glossy coiffure and natural elegance, Mme Royal is the first Frenchwoman to earn a sniff of real power since the disastrous prime ministerial interlude of Edith Cresson in the early 1990s.

Such ignominy did Mme Cresson heap upon the office - achieving, in the process, a staggering disapproval rating of 87 per cent - that many analysts doubted whether the country would allow another woman in a top job for generations.

But although Mme Royal comes from the same over-educated, administrative class background that produced Mme Cresson, she is a far more engaging, sophisticated, and, therefore, plausible prospect for the Elysée Palace than any woman before her.

Disdainful of the boutique Leftism and Anglophobia that pervades the elite of the French Socialist Party, she speaks up for social conservatism, with its focus on family and community values, and has praised the achievements of Tony Blair's Britain. "I think Blair has been unfairly caricatured in France," she said recently.

"It doesn't bother me to adhere to some of his ideas."

Polls show her to be streets ahead of all other Socialist candidates - including her long-time (and, many say, long-suffering) live-in boyfriend, François Hollande, the party chairman.(...)
By contrast, M Sarkozy is speeding along with all wagons loaded. The wildly ambitious interior minister has made no secret of where he stands on the key issues - a mending of relations with Britain and the United States, a reform of France's over-regulated, sclerotic economy, and "the immigration we want to have, not the immigration that is imposed upon us". It is a package that may prove hard to beat.

The polls, while fickle, already show the Right-wing candidate with a consistent edge - yet an edge narrow enough to make commentators confident that Sego v Sarko will be the most absorbing and significant political showdown in modern French history. "Opinion polls do not make an election," Mme Royal says. "What people recognise in me is the work I have done. I am a fighter."

The fight will be tough and ugly, but in 1972 only half of French voters believed that a woman would ever become president and now nine out of 10 do. Now that is "le phénomène Sego".


http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/200...

"Les socialistes vont-ils saisir cette chance en or ?" s'interroge le New Statesman.

L'hebdomadaire britannique de gauche le New Statesman trouve de nombreuses qualités à la candidate Royal. Mais son parti n'arrive pas, selon l'hebdomadaire, à tirer profit d'un climat politique qui devrait lui être favorable. "Loin de se délecter des difficultés traversées par le gouvernement, les socialistes sont inquiets, déplore le New Statesman. Le Parti socialiste serait en fait trop occupé par une autre question, fondamentale celle-là pour son orientation : "Faut-il combattre le capitalisme à la manière de l'extrême gauche ou le réformer à l'instar de Blair ?


The prospect of a woman being elected President of France next spring has moved from curiosity to distinct possibility, according to a poll published today.

Could that woman also be, something virtually unheard of on the French Left, a Blairiste?
The Socialist former health and education minister Ségolène Royal is now the favourite among French voters as the main candidate of the centre left.
A poll published today by the news magazine Marianne also suggests, for
the first time, that she is capable of beating the centre right favourite, Nicolas Sarkozy, in the second round of the election proper in May next year.
The half-declared presidential candidacy of Mme Royal, 52, has irritated other would-be Socialist nominees, not least because she is the partner of the party’s leader, François Hollande. The couple have four children but have never married, by the choice of Mme Royal.
In recent days, other would-be Socialist presidential candidates have found a new, and possibly more effective, reason to throw stones at Ségolène Royal. She has declared herself an admirer of some of the policies of Tony Blair - a heretical admission for anyone on the French left, even the centre left.
On Friday, Mme Royal, president of the Poitou-Charente region in western France, said that Mr Blair and his pro-market policies were unfairly « caricatured » by the French left. She reminded Blair-bashers in her own party that « Tony Blair won the Olympic Games and we didn’t. »
This amounted to a direct criticism of her fellow leading Socialist, Bertrand Delanoe, the mayor of Paris, who led the capital’s bid for the 2012 Olympics. M. Delanoe backs a third presidential bid by the retired former prime minister, Lionel Jospin. By attacking M. Delanoe’s Olympic bid as « dated », Mme Royal was indirectly dismissing M. Jospin as a man of the past.
A couple of days earlier, in an interview with the Financial Times, Mme Royal praised New Labour policies on youth employment and public services. « It does not bother me to state my support for some of (Tony Blair’s) ideas. He re-invested in public services. In dealing with youth unemployment, he has had real success by linking greater flexibility with greater security. »
Until now, Mme Royal has avoided making detailed policy pronouncements.
She is to publish a book on her vision of France’s future in April. Some Socialist figures see her pro-Blair remarks as her « first blunder ». Voices close to M. Jospin and another former premier and would-be presidential candidate, Laurent Fabius, say she is trying to position herself as a moderniser. If so, they say, she has misread the anti-market mood on the French left.
A CSA poll today suggests that Mme Royal would beat M. Sarkozy in the second-round run-off of a presidential poll by 51 per cent to 49 per cent.
The prospect of a woman being elected President of France next spring has moved from curiosity to distinct possibility, according to a poll published today.
Could that woman also be, something virtually unheard of on the French Left, a Blairiste?
The Socialist former health and education minister Ségolène Royal is now the favourite among French voters as the main candidate of the centre left.
A poll published today by the news magazine Marianne also suggests, for the first time, that she is capable of beating the centre right favourite, Nicolas Sarkozy, in the second round of the election proper in May next year.

Could French voters put a woman in the Élysée Palace?

Adam Sage

Can they seize their golden chance?

The prospect of a woman being elected President of France next spring has moved from curiosity to distinct possibility, according to a poll published today.

Could that woman also be, something virtually unheard of on the French Left, a Blairiste?
The Socialist former health and education minister Ségolène Royal is now the favourite among French voters as the main candidate of the centre left.

A poll published today by the news magazine Marianne also suggests, for the first time, that she is capable of beating the centre right favourite, Nicolas Sarkozy, in the second round of the election proper in May next year.

The half-declared presidential candidacy of Mme Royal, 52, has irritated other would-be Socialist nominees, not least because she is the partner of the party’s leader, François Hollande. The couple have four children but have never married, by the choice of Mme Royal.

In recent days, other would-be Socialist presidential candidates have found a new, and possibly more effective, reason to throw stones at Ségolène Royal. She has declared herself an admirer of some of the policies of Tony Blair - a heretical admission for anyone on the French left, even the centre left.
On Friday, Mme Royal, president of the Poitou-Charente region in western France, said that Mr Blair and his pro-market policies were unfairly « caricatured » by the French left. She reminded Blair-bashers in her own party that « Tony Blair won the Olympic Games and we didn’t. »

This amounted to a direct criticism of her fellow leading Socialist, Bertrand Delanoe, the mayor of Paris, who led the capital’s bid for the 2012 Olympics. M. Delanoe backs a third presidential bid by the retired former prime minister, Lionel Jospin. By attacking M. Delanoe’s Olympic bid as « dated », Mme Royal was indirectly dismissing M. Jospin as a man of the past.
A couple of days earlier, in an interview with the Financial Times, Mme Royal praised New Labour policies on youth employment and public services. « It does not bother me to state my support for some of (Tony Blair’s) ideas. He re-invested in public services. In dealing with youth unemployment, he has had real success by linking greater flexibility with greater security. »
Until now, Mme Royal has avoided making detailed policy pronouncements.

She is to publish a book on her vision of France’s future in April. Some Socialist figures see her pro-Blair remarks as her « first blunder ». Voices close to M. Jospin and another former premier and would-be presidential candidate, Laurent Fabius, say she is trying to position herself as a moderniser. If so, they say, she has misread the anti-market mood on the French left.
A CSA poll today suggests that Mme Royal would beat M. Sarkozy in the second-round run-off of a presidential poll by 51 per cent to 49 per cent.

The prospect of a woman being elected President of France next spring has moved from curiosity to distinct possibility, according to a poll published today.

Could that woman also be, something virtually unheard of on the French Left, a Blairiste?
The Socialist former health and education minister Ségolène Royal is now the favourite among French voters as the main candidate of the centre left.

A poll published today by the news magazine Marianne also suggests, for the first time, that she is capable of beating the centre right favourite, Nicolas Sarkozy, in the second round of the election proper in May next year.

Could French voters put a woman in the Élysée Palace?

Ségolène Royal, the rising star of the French Socialist party, is a keen admirer of Tony Blair and could draw on some of the UK prime minister's policies if elected France's first woman president in next year's elections.

Her comments may surprise some people. While Mr Blair is widely admired by Europe's social democrats for reinvigorating the Labour party, that view is not widely held in France where many socialists who would otherwise be aligned with the Blair project see him as a crypto-Thatcherite.

"I think Tony Blair has been caricatured in France. It does not bother me to claim adherence to some of his ideas," Ms Royal told the FT. "He has reinvested in public services. On youth unemployment, he has had real success by using more flexibility but also more security."

"Young graduates are better treated in the UK than in France, so it is not just for tax reasons that so many of our young are leaving France to go and work in the City of London," said Ms Royal, distancing herself from her party's deeply ingrained suspicion of Anglo-Saxon capitalism and Blairism. "We must not be blocked on any issues - like the 35-hour week, for instance," she said.

However, Ms Royal may disappoint any overseas investors hoping she could become the acceptable face of French socialism, as her ideas seem to be equally inspired by late president François Mitterrand, her former political master.

"How can the government cut public sector recruitment while the interior minister is calling for more police in schools, on trains and in the suburbs?"

She is also a critic of the government's labour market reforms, giving small businesses and employers of young people more flexibility by allowing them to fire staff easily in the first two years of a contract. "It is bad. It hits youth and gives them the wrong message by devaluing work," she said.

Although much of her economic and foreign policy ideas are shrouded in mystery, work under way in a small factory in Paris's sleepy 11th arrondissement confirms her celebrity status on the French left.

The creation of a puppet modelled on Ms Royal for the satirical television show Les Guignols (the French equivalent of the UK's Spitting Image) is the latest sign that she has hit the political big time.

Ms Royal is the opinion polls' favourite to be the Socialist party candidate in next year's presidential elections.

Barely a day goes by in France without a debate on television or in the press about whether she is the left's best chance of beating Nicolas Sarkozy, the early presidential favourite on the right, or just a fad who will vanish as quickly as she arrived.



Royal the favourite to reign over left in French politics