During a recent visit to Granville, in Normandy, the Modem candidate, François Bayrou,who has been overtaken by Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the polls, began by revealing his early morning bad mood before dismissing out of hand the pessimistic predictions of the pollsters and the media ‘Cassandras’.
This is one in a series of translations into English of French media coverage of the French presidential elections, by students from Lille 3 University masters degree course in English-French translation, MéLexTraJET. Their English versions, complete with glossaries and information notes, provide a rich insight into the campaign, the candidates and the manner in which the elections are reported in France.
For a glossary of party names, click here, for another on the French media click here and for an A-Z of key terms, personalities, dates and events, click here. For the MélExTraJET blog on mediapart with the complete collection of articles, click here.
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Photo: François Bayrou at Granville harbour, DR.
Article Source: “Le déni de Bayrou, candidat grognon”, by Laureline Dupont published in weekly magazine Marianne 2 (07/04/2012).
It’s Friday morning. François Bayrou walks into the Saint-Lazare train station (Paris) with a determined stride. Without greeting his team, who are waiting for him on the platform, he climbs aboard the train that’s going to take him to Caen and walks through the carriages with a sullen air. Then, to the photographers intent on immortalising his every move, he grumbles irritably: “A guy taking off his jacket, what a fascinating shot!” According to a staff member, the “boss” is not a morning person.
The train begins to pull away. Bayrou settles back into his seat, grabs a newspaper and starts pouring over the economics section. Too bad for the journalists waiting feverishly for a possible statement, for the time being the centrist candidate doesn’t feel like talking. Then, all of a sudden, he looks up from his newspaper and breaks the silence, “This strike is going to end badly!” That’s it for now.
Trustworthy
Thirty minutes later, a shade more relaxed, the candidate from the Béarn region strikes up a conversation. Nicolas Sarkozy’s plan? “Done nothing, going to do nothing.” François Hollande’s? “Unconvincing.” As for Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who has taken on the mantle of the third man in the polls, he lies through his teeth. “You cannot betray a people more than when you make them believe the answer’s very easy.” End of story.
So that leaves him, François Bayrou, as the one and only trustworthy candidate, “a man of truth and action.” He is sure that “in 2012, people feel more left out of the issues of the presidential campaign than in 2007. The gravity of the situation is making citizens more worried.” As is often the case with Bayrou, his assessment is correct, harsh and implacable. So why on earth does it fall on deaf ears? First and foremost he blames the media for playing the game of bipartisan polarisation. But “the campaign is not over yet,” insists the leader of an independent centre party. True, the third man from 2007 will still need to turn the tables, to start talking tough with his rivals and to make himself heard by outlining detailed proposals.
Uncompromising
When he suggests banning private donations to fund presidential campaigns, he avoids mentioning the name of Nicolas Sarkozy, who is suspected of having received money from the Bettencourts in the middle of the 2007 campaign. When he denounces a project “unworthy of a president of the Republic,” he’s quick to inform journalists that “it’s off the record.” Yet, when it’s suggested that being tougher would not be a bad thing for him, he says, “I don’t need to toughen up my statements! I have an uncompromising attitude. Nobody has been as tough as I have over the past few years.” Bayrou is certainly uncompromising when it comes to self-belief.
Clear
As for the way he presents his program, he brooks no criticism. When someone has the temerity to ask, “Do you understand the criticisms of those people who vote for you who…” the Modem candidate replies, “there is no criticism!” A lack of concrete proposals then? An advocate of the “Produire en France” motto, François Bayrou has never given a precise answer to this key question: how can French people be persuaded to buy a product Made in France if it is more expensive than something Made in Germany or Made in China? The French will make an effort to pay “an extra 15 euros for an Armor Lux jumper” because it was made “at home,” full stop. But coming from the candidate who keeps reminding us of “the people who run out of money by the 15th of the month,” this retort is surprising and inadequate. No matter, he is deeply convinced, “No proposal is more concrete than the one that states: We will win back all the sectors of the French economy, one by one.” Is Bayrou in denial? “The idea of me spending my time looking at myself in a mirror wondering what we might have done better is not exactly my idea of a man of action.”
Translation: Agnès Brihaye, Aurélie Gontier and Mélanie Benaiteau
Editing: Sam Trainor