“YOU EMBODY France. You symbolise the Republic.”
With those words, spoken by the head of the constitutional council, François Hollande was proclaimed president of France. Even in a ceremony as studiously low-key as that requested by the incoming president yesterday, the pomp with which France inaugurates its republican monarchs could never fully be shaken off.
Hollande arrived at the Élysée Palace on the stroke of 10am. In the sunlit courtyard he walked along a red carpet to the steps where Nicolas Sarkozy, the outgoing head of state, was waiting with an outstretched arm.
Hundreds of journalists watched from the rooftop, and from every window staff stretched for a glimpse of the handover. “Merci, Nicolas”, came the call from the crowd of Sarkozy supporters gathered at the gate.
The two men then disappeared inside for a private meeting where, it is said, Sarkozy handed over France’s nuclear codes to his successor. Afterwards the two politicians were joined by Hollande’s partner, Valérie Trierweiler, and Sarkozy’s wife, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. They spoke a little awkwardly on the steps of the Élysée before the Sarkozys waved goodbye and were driven away. A few Sarkozy staffers shed tears. The handover had taken half an hour.
In the red-and-gold Salle des Fêtes, surrounded by a small group of friends and supporters, Hollande was handed the official chain of office, a gold collar weighing nearly 1kg engraved with the names of all Fifth Republic presidents.
Symbolically if not explicitly, Hollande sought to make a clean break with the Sarkozy era yesterday. The man who won the election promising a humble, “normal” presidency after five years under the mercurial, hyperactive Sarkozy gave plenty of signals of intent.
In 2007 Sarkozy and his then wife, Cécilia, celebrated with their children and hundreds of supporters. Yesterday Hollande’s children weren’t there, and the short guest list seemed to have been drafted so as to avoid any sign of triumphalism or partisan joy. The Socialist Party may have been tempted to rejoice at taking control of the Élysée for the first time in 17 years, but yesterday the watchword was solemnity.
“We are a single France, undivided,” Mr Hollande said in a short speech, promising a presidency of “dignity, simplicity and sobriety”. He saluted each of the previous presidents, reflecting briefly on their individual contributions. Pointedly, he didn’t mention any of Sarkozy’s achievements, saying simply that he wished him well in his new life. By that time television pictures were showing Sarkozy, by then just a private citizen, going for a run in his local park.
Within the strictures of presidential tradition, Hollande found room to put down some symbolic markers. He was driven up the Champs-Élysées in an open-topped hybrid Citroën, and stood drenched in the pouring rain before laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier under the Arc de Triomphe.
Then came two personal homages: first, in the Tuileries gardens, to Jules Ferry, the 19th-century statesman regarded as the father of France’s free, secular school system; second, across town, to Marie Curie, the Polish-born scientist and Nobel prizewinner. Hollande had placed education, research and youth at the heart of his campaign, and promised to appoint as many women as men to his government.
At each stop Hollande made impromptu walkabouts to greet well-wishers, as if trying to stress his election slogan about remaining close to the people was more than an empty catchphrase.
The closest we got yesterday to a note of celebration was when Hollande arrived at city hall for his final engagement before flying to Berlin. There, given a standing ovation led by the socialist mayor Bertrand Delanoë and what seemed like the party’s entire officer corps, president Hollande let his guard down for a moment and allowed himself a smile.
