Sarkozy accused of nepotism over son's rising star

PARIS - The probable appointment of a 23-year-old Paris law student to run Europe's largest office development has generated a storm of protest and mockery in France, including an 8000-name petition on the internet.

His critics say the student has only one qualification to become the next political boss of the lucrative but floundering La defence business district west of the city centre.

The student's name is Jean Sarkozy, the son of the President of the Republic.

The President's political party says Jean Sarkozy, who is in his second year of a law degree at the University of Paris-Sorbonne, is "the most legitimate" candidate for the job.

A taller, blonder, more handsome version of his father, he said modestly: "I am not more legitimate than other candidates but nor am I less legitimate."

Sarkozy jnr already leads his father's centre-right party, the Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP), on the council of Hauts-de-Seine, the wealthiest department in France.

He is, in theory, a shoo-in for the party's nomination to be the new head of La defence's public management body this month, and for the final appointment in December.

But the prospect of a 23-year-old being catapulted into such a powerful, if unpaid, position has raised howls of fury and derision.

The former presidential candidate Francois Bayrou accused the Sarkozys of taking France back to the days of imperial Rome, when the Emperor Caligula appointed his horse as consul.

Other critics have spoken of the "Berlusconisation" of France.

The criticism comes not only from the President's usual opponents on the left and centre. The online forums of Le Figaro - a centre-right newspaper which supports President Sarkozy - were packed yesterday with angry messages condemning the latest move in the fast-track career of "Sarkozy fils".

One typical message reads: "My grandson is in the second year of kindergarten and loves aeroplanes. Do you think he has a chance of becoming boss of Air France next year?"

Jean Sarkozy shot to prominence soon after his father's election in 2007. He supported a renegade candidate for the President's original fiefdom as Mayor of Neuilly-sur-Seine, a wealthy Paris suburb.

Last year, soon after marrying an heiress, he ran successfully for a county council seat and was elected as leader of the UMP group on the Hauts-de-Seine council.

Observers of the tangled and poisonous web of Hauts-de-Seine politics say it is too simple to suggest that Sarkozy has pushed his son forward.

They say the President, who himself became Mayor of Neuilly at 28, has been fascinated and exasperated by the depth of his son's hunger and ambition (although he has done little to curb them).

- INDEPENDENT