This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/21/france-francois-fillon-alain-juppe-nicolas-sarkozy
The article has changed 9 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 0 | Version 1 |
|---|---|
| France's 'Fillon miracle' forces rethinking of loyalties on centre-right | |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| France’s centre-right heavyweights were forced to realign their loyalties on Monday, after “third man” François Fillon claimed a surprise victory in the first round of his party’s presidential primaries. | France’s centre-right heavyweights were forced to realign their loyalties on Monday, after “third man” François Fillon claimed a surprise victory in the first round of his party’s presidential primaries. |
| The gloves are now off between Fillon, 62, who scored 44% of Sunday’s vote, and Alain Juppé, 71, who scored 28%, for the second-round vote next weekend. | |
| Whichever of the two former prime ministers wins will become the candidate of the centre-right opposition party Les Républicains, and is expected to be the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen’s only credible opponent in the presidential election next spring. | |
| In the wake of Fillon’s triumph, former ministers and losing candidates – including former president Nicolas Sarkozy, who once described his one-time prime minister as “Mister Nobody” – declared they would support him in the second round. | |
| Sarkozy crashed out of the primaries with only 20.6% of the vote. Shortly after his defeat he called on supporters to throw their weight behind Fillon. | Sarkozy crashed out of the primaries with only 20.6% of the vote. Shortly after his defeat he called on supporters to throw their weight behind Fillon. |
| Among those who responded to the call were former prime minister and presidential candidate Édouard Balladur, and Sarkozy supporters Brice Hortefeux and Rachida Dati, as well as fellow first-round loser Bruno Le Maire. | |
| On the other hand, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morziet, who came fourth in the primary has announced she will support Juppé, as have former prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and former minister Valérie Pécresse. | On the other hand, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morziet, who came fourth in the primary has announced she will support Juppé, as have former prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and former minister Valérie Pécresse. |
| The other first-round contenders, Jean-François Copé, former head of the centre-right party, and Jean-Frédéric Poisson of the Christian Democrat party, have yet to declare their second-round allegiance. François Bayrou, the president of the centrist party MoDem, has already called for his supporters to vote for Juppé. | |
| For French pollsters and politicians alike, Fillon’s massive victory came almost out of nowhere. Just a week ago, polls had him rising in popularity but still relegated to third place, behind Juppé and Sarkozy. | For French pollsters and politicians alike, Fillon’s massive victory came almost out of nowhere. Just a week ago, polls had him rising in popularity but still relegated to third place, behind Juppé and Sarkozy. |
| But a strong performance in primary debates appears to have meant his programme, described as an “economic and social transformation” to the right of that proposed by the more centrist Juppé, cut through eventually. | But a strong performance in primary debates appears to have meant his programme, described as an “economic and social transformation” to the right of that proposed by the more centrist Juppé, cut through eventually. |
| Fillon’s key measures include increasing the 35-hour maximum working week to a 39-hour week for public sector workers, gradually raising the retirement age to 65, reducing unemployment benefits, increasing VAT by two points and reducing direct taxes, as well as cutting 500,000 public sector jobs and making €100bn spending cuts to reduce the public debt and balance the country’s books. | Fillon’s key measures include increasing the 35-hour maximum working week to a 39-hour week for public sector workers, gradually raising the retirement age to 65, reducing unemployment benefits, increasing VAT by two points and reducing direct taxes, as well as cutting 500,000 public sector jobs and making €100bn spending cuts to reduce the public debt and balance the country’s books. |
| Juppé, who served as prime minister under President Jacques Chirac, has also pledged to do away with the 35-hour week in both public and private sectors, to increase the number of police and gendarmes to counter the terrorist threat, to create full employment by 2022, to make cuts in unemployment benefits and to reduce taxes, particularly for businesses, as well as cutting public spending. | |
| Jean-Christophe Cambadélis, of the ruling Socialist party, which will hold its own primaries in the new year – most likely without the desperately unpopular François Hollande – said: “The right has chosen a candidate who is well to the right, he’s the ultra candidate: ultra-conservative, ultra-liberal, ultra-anti-gay marriage, ultra-antisocial, he ticks all the boxes. It’s the ultra-right and it’s also a straight bridge with the Front National in terms of identity and the idea of the family.” | |
| Although Sarkozy’s final speech on Sunday advised followers to vote for Fillon, an avowed Thatcherite, there is little love lost between the two veterans of French politics. | Although Sarkozy’s final speech on Sunday advised followers to vote for Fillon, an avowed Thatcherite, there is little love lost between the two veterans of French politics. |
| In 2007, the newly elected president, Sarkozy, appointed Fillon to the PM’s post as a gesture of gratitude for a successful campaign, which the veteran politician had run. Those close to Sarkozy expected him to fire Fillon shortly afterwards. | |
| The dismissal never came. Not because Sarkozy had changed his mind, but because Fillon’s popularity rose with the voting public, enabling him to doggedly cling to his post. The president then spent his five years in office humiliating his colleague, referring to him publicly as an underling there to carry out presidential orders and nicknaming him “Mister Nobody”. | |
| On Sunday, Fillon served his revenge cold. “Fillon has signed Sarkozy’s political death warrant: this historical boomerang, a double surprise of the right and centre’s primary, will go down in history …” wrote Cécile Cornudet in Les Echos. | |
| “On paper, François Fillon had no chance of finishing ahead in the first round Sunday … but the voters’ wishing to play with the predictions went in his favour,” she added. “History has shown us that nobody is ever dead in politics, and has added a nuance in this curious period where surprise has become the rule and when one can rise in the polls and reverse the table in less than three weeks.” | “On paper, François Fillon had no chance of finishing ahead in the first round Sunday … but the voters’ wishing to play with the predictions went in his favour,” she added. “History has shown us that nobody is ever dead in politics, and has added a nuance in this curious period where surprise has become the rule and when one can rise in the polls and reverse the table in less than three weeks.” |
| The French press agreed it was the ultimate humiliation for the former president who was declared the victim of a wave of “anti-Sarkozism”. Libération described it as “the Fillon miracle”. | The French press agreed it was the ultimate humiliation for the former president who was declared the victim of a wave of “anti-Sarkozism”. Libération described it as “the Fillon miracle”. |
| “Behind the right’s primary was hidden a referendum over the return to business for Nicolas Sarkozy, but also a stupefying majority in favour of François Fillon,” it wrote. | “Behind the right’s primary was hidden a referendum over the return to business for Nicolas Sarkozy, but also a stupefying majority in favour of François Fillon,” it wrote. |
| Le Monde’s editorial said the second round would be a battle between the “Thatcher right and the Chirac right”. Fillon, it wrote, represented the “traditional right, solid, serious, provincial and Catholic, notable and well brought-up”. On the other side, it described Juppé as a successor to the former president Jacques Chirac, under whom he served as prime minister – unlikely to cause a social revolution after provoking three weeks of mass demonstrations over his proposed social security reforms in 1995. “He is the upholder of a more moderate, more careful and, he says, more realistic right,” it said. |