Hollande may fill spot as Sarkozy's top challenger

Francois Hollande. Photo / AP

The "nearly man" of French politics, Francois Hollande, emerged yesterday as the most likely centre-left presidential challenger to Nicolas Sarkozy in a spot opened up by the travails of Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

A poll suggested Hollande, 57, had sprung into a commanding lead in the Socialist Party primary, which will take place in October.

Hollande, a former leader of the Parti Socialiste, was already rising in the polls before Strauss-Kahn's arrest in New York at the weekend, and in a poll for Le Parisien yesterday, he was the choice of 49 per cent of Socialist Party members and 37 per cent of supporters of the wider French left.

The party leader, Martine Aubry, had the support of 23 per cent of socialists.

Much could yet change. Socialist voters have been stunned by the gravity of the accusations of sexual assault against the party's long-time - if undeclared - presidential favourite. Other candidates may yet enter the race, including Laurent Fabius, a former Prime Minister.

Sarkozy is reported to have told friends last year that Hollande was the Socialist candidate he most feared.

Hollande predicted recently that voters would be in the mood for a "dull, serious" leader in the 2012 election after the excitable "bling-bling presidency" of Sarkozy.

He also told supporters he was convinced he could defeat the eloquent but brittle Strauss-Kahn. He could not have foreseen that the "DSK" candidature would spectacularly crash and burn.

- INDEPENDENT