Olivier Falorni - well and truly "April Fooled"

Remember Olivier Falorni?

He's the man who, after having received the support of that infamous Tweet from the former first lady Valérie Trierweiler, went on to beat Ségolène Royal, the Socialist party's official candidate for La Rochelle, in the 2012 parliamentary elections.

(screenshot Le Grand Journal, Canal + January 2014)

It was a defeat which stymied Royal's chances of being chosen to be the president of the national assembly and left many wondering whether she would ever make a return to frontline politics.

Meanwhile Falorni took his seat in parliament, joining the group of the Parti Radical de Gauche, (Radical Party of the Left, PRG) rather than that of the ruling Socialist party.

And little or nothing was heard of him in the national media...until last week that is.

Because the 42-year-old was the "victim" of an April Fool: one played on him by the comedian and impersonator, Gérald Dahan.

April 1 was the day the newly-appointed prime minister, Manuel Valls, was busy putting together "his" new government - and an ideal opportunity for Dahan to continue his practice of playing pranks on well-known people (and especially politicians) by ringing them under the guise of being someone else.

He has done it before to the likes of, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, Nicolas Sarkozy and, yes, even Royal.

It might not always be particularly clever or amusing, but it invariably reveals more than the butt of the joke might wish to be made public.

And that's exactly what happened on April 1.

Dahan rang Falorni, pretending to be Valls and wanting to know whether the 42-year-old would be interested in a job in the new government.

During the course of the conversation, Falorni disclosed what he (and many others) thought of Royal: how she was "uncontrollable and unpredictable" and how working with her (or under her as a junior minister) would be unthinkable.

But as you can hear from the clip which Yann Barthés and his team at Le Petit Journal on Canal + (inevitably) played on Friday evening's edition, Falorni eventually agreed to accept a position in the government with Royal as his immediate boss.

There are also some delicious behind-the-scenes disclosures from Falorni as to how many of those public alliances between "leading" members of the Socialist party are...well "surprising" to say the least.

Le Petit Journal du 04/04 - Gérald Dahan imite Manuel Valls et piège Olivier Falorni

Whoopee! Another week in French politics with best buddies, Manuel Valls (again) and Inspecteur Gadget

The political week in France began with the Socialist party holding its annual summer shindig in La Rochelle.

Well strictly speaking it was last weekend, but hey ho. Give a guy a little temporal (as related to time rather than spiritual) break please.

The great and the glorious were there, including the party's new best friends, the interior minister Manuel Valls and the justice minister Christine Taubira.

We know they're now best buddies, in spite of the former recently trying to tell the latter how to do her job properly, because Valls said so, insisting that they were both "working hand in hand to achieve the same thing - a fair and effective policy."

Valls was certainly good value for money.  Up there on the podium, he looked ready to implode (he so often does, don't you think?) as he seethed, spluttered, yelled and sometimes cooed his way through 20 minutes. There's no doubting, he sure can orate.


Valls: "L'immigration doit être régulée et... par BFMTV

Sadly the same could not be said for his immediate boss, the prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, who closed the conference on Sunday.

Sure he tried to bring the whole shebang to a conclusion with a speech showing who was in charge (and don't say "nobody") and a warning that, "Personal games could ruin the collective efforts."

http://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/politique/la-rochelle-quand-jean-marc-ayrault-prend-les-commandes_1275780.html

But really. Even if he thought anyone was listening and taking note, did he honestly believe they were taking any notice?

A far less apoplectic Valls (yes that man again) popped up on the revamped "Le Grand Journal" on Canal + on Monday evening.

He was the guest of honour as the show's new anchor, Antoine de Caunes, and his team went on the attack.

That photo spread with his wife in Paris Match, his own personal crusading Tour de France over the summer, and the media love-in for a man who clearly knew where the cameras were.

"Wasn't it all a bit too reminiscent of a certain former French president," he was asked.

The interior minister more than held his own - and kept his cool. But it was a little like watching a double of the real thing (Nicolas Sarkozy, just in case you were wondering) in action.

LE GRAND JOURNAL du 26/08/13 - Part. 2 Valls, la star de l'été

The programme would probably have been a good deal more interesting had another guest not been disinvited.

Daniel Cohn-Bendit had also been slated to appear, but the invitation was withdrawn at the last moment because "Valls wanted to be the only one on the programme" according to Cohn-Bendit who is now a political commentator on Europe 1 radio.

"It's not important. In fact it's rather amusing really," he said. "But it's symptomatic of what I call a 'presidential virus' in which he (Valls) is trying to project a presidential image."



Tous candidats à l’élection présidentielle ! par Europe1fr

Nothing of the sort, according to the show's production team.

It was simply that the same sort of editorial decision had been taken as similar programmes on other channels: namely to concentrate on a debriefing after the conference in La Rochelle.

http://www.jeanmarcmorandini.com/article-309004-cohn-bendit-affirme-avoir-ete-deprogramme-du-grand-journal-a-la-demande-de-manuel-valls-la-reponse-de-la-production.html

Ho hum. We believe you.

Back to Ayrault for a moment, and the prime minister finally unveiled the government's proposals for pension reform...or non-reform as the "reformettes" have also been described.

Although it's an important subject, pensions can also appear terribly tedious stuff and successive French governments have shown a talent for regularly tinkering with a complex system and making it even more incomprehensible.

The current government is no exception.

But just in case you want to try to understand what is being proposed, here's a link to a piece in the Wall Street Journal.

Finally, the French president, François Hollande, came out of his hidey hole this week to deliver an impassioned speech on the situation in Syria.

"France is ready to punish (ooh puhleeze, who the heck was his speechwriter?) those who took the heinous decision to gas innocents," he told an annual meeting in Paris of French ambassadors from around the world, undoubtedly striking fear into the very heart of Bashar al-Assad's regime.

And while Hollande waits for other international leaders to decide what, if any, action should be taken, the weekly news magazine Le Point was once again poking fun at him with a very telling front cover of its latest edition.

It features a head and shoulder shot of a half-smiling Hollande, left hand held aloft and the gloriously appropriate headline "Inspecteur Gadget"...described by that online bible of all that is true and factual, Wikipedia, as "a clumsy, dim-witted cyborg detective".

Gadget, that is. Not Hollande.

Or there again.

That's all for this week folks.

Have a great weekend.

screenshot front cover Le Point

Another week in French politics with la rentrée, crystal balls and, of course, Manuel Valls

Government ministers returned to work this week refreshed from their short break and intent on cracking on with the business of running the country...in 2025.

They all sat down and decided to cope with the problems currently facing France by gazing into their collective crystal ball to predict the rosiest of futures with "full employment, plenty of cheap housing, a new Industrial Revolution and Police 3.0."

Do what?

Yes apparently "anyone who wants a job will be able to get one," according to the finance minister Pierre Moscovici. And the country will have "regained its fiscal sovereignty."

Oh yes. And France will be officially renamed "Cloud Cuckoo Land".

Eat your heart out, Émile Coué!

Back to reality though and the week started off with a wannabe prime minister, Claude Bartolone, and a wannabe president Arnaud Montebourg (presumably one of the architects of that 2025 Industrial Revolution) holding hands (metaphorically speaking, you understand) unified for la Fête de la Rose de Frangy-en-Bresse.

It was all very casual. A no-tie, open-collar, friendly (well, as close as it gets in politics) sort of affair to show how 'unified" they both were; the president of the National Assembly and
the minister of industrial renewal.

Smile for the camera guys!

Over at the centre-right UMP (renamed until further notice Union pour un mouvement pauvre), another wannabe leader was staking his claim.

Laurent Wauquiez followed...er...in his own footsteps (or the tradition of the former Socialist president François Mitterrand who used to make an annual ascent of the roche de Solutré) by taking his once-a-year hike up mont Mézenc.

What is it with politicians and hills?

Surrounded by his personal fan club from the like-minded "droite sociale",  Wauquiez was apparently showing what a free-thinking, independent kind of politician he was...well at least until it becomes necessary to foster alliances with the forces of darkness from another part of the UMP.

Meanwhile yet another wannabe - prime minister, president and master of the universe - and darling of the right, the interior minister Manuel Valls, "shocked" some in his own (Socialist - and you might need to be reminded of that now and then) party with statements that seemed...well, a little off message.

France faces two major challenges in ensuring how people here can all live together happily, according to the interior minister.

Number One - the birth rate among those of African origin in France would "force a rethink of our immigration policy and the issue of family reunification would have to be reviewed."

And Number Two - to show that "Islam was compatible with democracy."

Nabilla!

"Non, mais allô quoi?" to quote one of the great French thinkers of our time.

Weren't those exactly the sort of remarks Jean-Luc Mélenchon had been talking about during his interview with le Journal du Dimanche when he said, "Valls had been contaminated by the (thinking of the far-right) Front National"?

All right, so as the self-appointed leader (or at least one of them) of one of France's far-left parties, Mélenchon might get a heck of a kick out of putting the proverbial boot into his former Socialist party colleagues, but he has a point, hasn't he?

While on the subject of Valls - after all there was, and is, no getting away from him - the interior minister was quick to react to the latest deaths in Marseille, a city that has "long grappled with high crime rates that have increasingly become more violent over the years."

It was during Valls' appearance on BFM TV on Tuesday morning to explain what approach the government would be taking in Marseille, that the...er..."real" prime minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, got wind that the "wannabe" one (Valls) would be heading off to the southern French city to "sort things out" (paraphrasing).

Manuel Valls (screenshot BFMTV August 20, 2013)

Ayrault, always a man of action, reacted promptly, putting Valls firmly in his place and swooping on Marseille himself surrounded by five - yes count them - ministers: Valls (that'll learn yer sonny), Christine Taubira (justice), Marisol Touraine (social affairs), Cécile Duflot (housing) and Marie-Arlette Carlotti (junior minister for the disabled and from Marseille herself).

And just to show how much in charge he was, Ayrault annouced exactly what Valls had been planning to say - measures to beef up of the police presence in the city.

Way to go, M Ayrault!



Finally - skipping over the first cabinet meeting and the proposed reform of the status of the auto-entrepreneur, the handling of which seems to epitomise the government's clarity and coherence on the subject, no political rentrée would be complete without yet another failed attempt at a comeback by the country's first lady of politics.

In her capacity as president of the region Poitou-Charentes, Ségolène Royal had planned a get-together lunch and a press conference for other Socialist party regional presidents as a "prelude" to the traditional annual meeting of party activists the last weekend of August in the town of La Rochelle.

Only it has been cancelled  because of lack of interest or, as Royal tweeted, "postponed by several days to prepare for the September 11 meeting at the Matignon (the prime minister's official residence)."

La Rochelle, you might remember, was the scene of Royal's ignominious defeat to fellow party member Olivier Falorni in last year's parliamentary elections.

And that, dear reader, is a round up of some of this week's political stories making the news here in France.

Bon week-end.

Martine Aubry ain't going until she's done

The Socialist party had its annual summer do - sorry, conference - over the weekend at La Rochelle in the western French département of Charente-Maritime.

Activists mingled with the "good the bad and the (ahem) ugly" of a party which holds power at just about every level in France.

Everyone who is anyone within the party turned up - well with two notable exceptions; François Hollande, because he's now "above" these sorts of things and...Ségolène Royal, who decided to give the place where she was electorally humiliated (again) back in June, a wide berth.

There again, Seggers had already put in a guest star appearance at the Green party's summer bash - sorry, conference - in Poitiers the week before.

So the Great and Glorious - minus the Two - were present to give themselves a collective pat on the back for all their electoral success and pay homage to the woman who had engineered victory, Martine Aubry.

Martine Aubry (screenshot Europe 1 interview)

We know that because she said as much.

"Back in 2009, here in La Rochelle, I outlined a 'road map' (don't you just love that expression?) for the future of the party," she told an attentive audience - all the more so because those present wanted to know whether she was going to stand down as leader and, if so, to whom she would give her blessing (Amen) as her successor.

More on that in a moment.

"That included being more aware of society's needs, doing away with the multiple mandates, gender diversity, the primaries and how best to get rid of that eternal pain, Seggers (all right, she didn't say that last bit, but she might just as well have done)."

Ah yes. as Libération wrote, Aubry was able to bask in the party's success due in no small measure, as far as she was concerned, to her own leadership.

All Hail Martine!

So now what?

Well, with bated (or baited, if you must) breath everyone waited to hear whether she would officially announce she wasn't going to stand again for the post at (yet another of) the party's conference in Toulouse in October.

She didn't.

Apparently everyone knows she's not going to run again, but nobody seems to have told Aubry. Or rather Aubry seems to have told nobody.

Er.

Well that's leadership for you. Keep everyone guessing right up until the last moment.

So what of the pretenders to the throne?

Well there are two of them.

First up is the wonderfully named Harlem Désir. No, not as in the dreadful 1980s single "Harlem Desire" from the British-German dance pop duo London Boys, (click on the link, if you dare, to discover just how awful it was) but the former president of the French anti-racist organisation, SOS Racisme, member of the European parliament and the party's number two.

Harlem Désir (from Wikipedia)

Désir would be the obvious choice especially as he took over the leadership temporarily when Aubry took the plunge and contested the party's primaries for this year's presidential elections, losing out in the second round head-to-head against Hollande (just in case you had forgotten).

Plus the 52-year-old is believed to have Hollande's backing.

But of course this is politics - and France is no different from any other country in having its fair share of intrigue and shrewd plotting.

Enter Jean-Christophe Cambadélis - or "Camba" as he has apparently been dubbed by Aubry - a former right-hand (or should that be left-hand) man to none other than Dominique Strauss-Kahn, whose shoes Aubry so reluctantly tried to fill in those very same primaries.

Both men were spotted at La Rochelle showing their full support for Aubry - naturally, but "Camba" was a little less subtle about it, cosying up even more closely to her supporters and earning the status of "friend" from another Aubry crony, Claude Bartolone, the president of the national assembly.

So Désir or Camba? Which of the two will it be should Aubry decide to step down?

Oh what a tough one.

Cue London Boys?


You have been warned



Just imagine the behind-the-scenes power Aubry could wield with Bartolone already perched at the national assembly and Camba installed as party leader.

Spare a thought for Désir.

Roll on Toulouse and the transparent vote.

Valérie Trierweiler's Tweet of support for Ségolène Royal's opponent

It was probably too good to last; the self-declared "normal" presidency of François Hollande.

He, his party and France have now been treated to the sort of celebrity-cum-politics behaviour reminiscent of the days of his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy.

And it's largely thanks to Hollande's partner, Valérie Trierweiler.

Valérie Trierweiler (screenshot YouTube video)

While the leader of the Socialist party, Martine Aubry, was on a "Save Ségolène Royal" mission to help the party's chosen candidate in her battle to win a seat in the second round of parliamentary elections, Trierweiler was putting her best stiletto heel foot forward and in the process carving out a new role for herself.

That of, in the words of L'Express magazine, the "minister of jealousy".

Trierweiler Tweeted (or should that be Twat) a message of support - for Olivier Falorni, the man running against Royal.

He has been a long-time Hollande supporter, even apparently at a time when it wasn't particularly fashionable, and as a loyal and experienced "man on the ground" had expected to be the party's candidate in the safe constituency of La Rochelle in the département of Charente-Maritime.

But the party decided differently, parachuting in Royal to contest the seat which would be the first step towards her eventually playing an important role and one she covets, as the president of the national assembly.

Farlorni, who's no fan of Royal, refused to withdraw his candidature, was suspended by the party and was only narrowly beaten in last Sunday's first round.

He's staying in the race for next weekend's second round and  presents a real threat to Royal's ambitions.

Enter stage left, the non-elected "minister of jealousy", Valerie Trierweiler, with a Tweet in which she wished Forloni "bon courage" and recognised his "years of selfless commitment (to the party)."

Just 146 not-so-innocent characters guaranteed to have an impact as the Socialist party was left jaw-to-floor, the centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) enjoyed the distraction from its own problems and the media - well, went wild with a story in an otherwise rather - er - dull election campaign.

So why did she do it?

Why did Trierweiler send that message of support using a social network knowing full well that it would be out there for everyone and anyone to read?

After all she's an experienced journalist, knows what she's doing, and is far - very far - from being daft.

Maybe, after all, there's something in that headline in L'Express and Trierweiler, even though she's now first lady, still resents Royal, the woman who was Hollande's partner for 30 years and with whom he had four children.

Jealousy - really?

Why not?

Trierweiler is on record as saying she didn't vote for Royal in the first round of the 2007 presidential elections and abstained in the second.

After reading in Paris Match - the magazine for which she writes - a piece on Thomas Hollande in which he was described as the oldest child of the "couple Royal-Hollande", Trierweiler sent her colleague a terse text message saying "The ex-couple Royal-Hollande. What are you playing at?"

And that moment at the victory celebrations at Place de la Bastille in Paris after Hollande had beaten Sarkozy in last month's presidential elections was surely a sign of what was to come.

Did you notice it? Trierweiler - and many others - certainly did: Hollande giving Royal a peck on the cheek.

How did she react? With an "order" so easy to read from her lips that Hollande kiss her on the mouth - now - in front of everyone.

The "Nicolas and Carla" show might no longer be centre stage as far as the celebrity gossip magazines and certain sectors of the mainstream media are concerned, but it looks as though a worthy replacement has been found, albeit so far, just a one-woman show.