Cecilia Sarkozy and Francois Hollande: not keen on living in the Elysee.
In the New York Times: A ‘First Spouse’ in France? Not Any Time Soon.
No matter who wins the presidency of France on May 6, life in the grand, presidential Élysée Palace is destined to change.
Unlike Bernadette Chirac, who has admitted that she’s going to “miss the house”, the spouses of current candidates Nicolas Sarkozy and Segolene Royal are not keen on moving into the bombastic presidential residence.
Francois Hollande, partner of Royal, and father of her four children, has made it clear from the start that he would not be joining her in Élysée Palace for her five-year term.
And Cecilia Sarkozy, the wife of Nicolas Sarkozy, said on a popular show “I don’t see myself as a first lady. That bores me. I am not politically correct.”
Does it matter? Probably not. Both couples have enough little hideaways in the country to make up for lost time. And the French gossip press is sufficiently muzzled to guarantee the presidential couple privacy. Under any roof.
