Love is in the air

Barely weeks after officially divorcing his apparent femme fatale, the enigmatic Cecilia, the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy is reportedly head over heels in love again.

And this time it’s with a leading French television journalist, who recently announced she was splitting from her husband of 14 years.

Laurence Ferrari is not just your run of the mill journo. The 41-year-old presented a number of documentaries on the country’s top-rated TF1 channel and hosted a lightweight political weekly magazine with her former husband, Thomas Hugues.

Indeed Hugues and Ferrari were so-to-speak the golden glamour couple of TV news, perhaps unkindly perceived as the network’s Ken and Barbie. And they were both regular stand-ins for the daily and weekend prime time news anchors Patrick Poivre d'Arvor and Claire Chazal.

But that all changed in Autumn last year when Ferrari was poached by a competitive network – Canal + – and given her own weekly political programme, the chance for her to go one-on-one with some of France’s leading figures.

And it was on the set of that show, Dimanche +, that she met the then presidential candidate in March this year – and by all reports the two clicked.

Over the past few months the couple have supposedly been spotted enjoying candlelit meals together in Paris, and Ferrari is a frequent visitor to the president’s official residence, the Elysée Palace.

She was even allegedly seen at the same hotel in Marrakech, during Sarkozy’s state visit to Morocco earlier this month.

Ah the true stuff of genuine journalism – gossip and speculation.

If the two workaholics do get together you, can bet that the French media will be the last to confirm the relationship as it has until recently been notoriously cautious in reporting the private lives of public people. France has very strict privacy laws.

Should the rumours be true, it won’t be the first time Sarkozy has had a fling with a journalist. Two years ago he was romantically linked to Anna Fulda, a reporter on the centre-right daily Le Figaro.

True or false, the rumours of the fledgling romance persist. And the assertion by an Elysée Palace spokesman that Sarkozy's personal life was "not open for discussion" will hardly help. Much the same response was given in the days leading up to the divorce from Cecilia last month.