TIMESONLINE: OVER the past few weeks a French cable television channel has been playing Love Actually, the film featuring Hugh Grant as a bachelor British prime minister who is smitten with a member of his staff.
France is lapping it up - the French prime minister’s household enjoyed a viewing recently – but no film could compete with the Gallic version unfolding in real life as Nicolas Sarkozy, the pint-sized president, is left on his own at the summit of power after separating from Cécilia, his glamorous wife.
Their divorce proceedings have unleashed a torrent of speculation about how “super Sarko”, as the hyperactive leader is known, will fare as the first bachelor head of state in France since Napoleon divorced Josephine when she could not bear him a child.
From François Mitterrand’s “secret” family to the escapades of Jacques Chirac – when he was mayor of Paris his nickname was “three minutes including shower” – French politicians’ love lives follow a colourful tradition. Although elected on a platform of “rupture” with the past, Sarkozy is unlikely to be the exception. Far from it.
In what seems certain to become a national pastime, speculation began last week about who would be the next “première dame” as the country prepared for the unprecedented spectacle of a president playing the field.
Sarkozy, who has two grown-up sons from his first marriage, is often described as a seductive figure and Cécilia, a tall former model who has two grown-up daughters from her own first marriage, enjoys the same reputation. Together they have Louis, a 10-year-old son, but the marriage had deteriorated recently to such an extent that Cécilia stopped appearing with Sarkozy in public, fuelling rumours that they may have sought comfort elsewhere.
“I dedicated 20 years of my life to Nicolas, 20 years that were not always easy, far from it,” Cécilia, 49, said yesterday in Elle magazine. “They were 20 years in which I devoted myself to him in the shadow.”
Sarkozy, who has made clear in the past how crucial Cécilia was to his wellbeing, seemed, nevertheless, to have begun turning the page. There is no shortage of women to keep him amused.
As he came out of a meeting with ministers a few weeks ago, a photographer caught him carrying a letter which said: “I haven’t seen you for an eternity and I miss you . . . a million little kisses.” French tongues wag as Nicolas Sarkozy plays the field (more) By Matthew Campbell in Paris
TIMESONLINE:
Cécilia Sarkozy in her own words
Mark Alexander
