The Mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, announced on Sunday 12 September in Rouen, her candidacy for a presidential mandate. She presented herself as a candidate from a modest family, ready to change the living conditions of disadvantaged people.
Anne Hidalgo, a Frenchwoman of Spanish origin, wants to lead France. She is a member of the Socialist Party (PS) and mayor of Paris. “I have decided to be a candidate for the presidency of the French Republic,” she told an audience committed to her cause. This was followed by a standing ovation.
She painted a bleak picture of France to her supporters. “This France of freedom sees its injustices widen every day, this France of fraternity is divided into hostile groups, into separate communities, into factions that express their bitterness, their anger sometimes with so much violence, before our eyes. The republican model is disintegrating,” she said.
“The challenges ahead, we know, are immense,” she said, already seeing herself in the presidential chair. “We must reinvent our French model, which has been weakened by its many crises. And this model will be based on one main value, as we know, the condition of life in common, consideration and respect,” she gave a preview of her program.
She presented herself as a unifying candidate, concerned with improving the living conditions of low-class people, as she herself comes from this category.
“I think of my father, who was a shipyard worker in Cadix, and my mother, a seamstress,” she said, revealing her humble origins. “Basically, nothing predestined me to make a statement…,” she said in Rouen, a city on the Seine in north-west France.
“I want the middle classes, the working classes, the precarious workers, the young people, who cannot be a sacrificed generation, that the disabled also find hope…,” she showed her focus.
She showed concern for women whose rights are denied, discrimination against French men and women born of immigrants, the lack of consideration for health workers and scientists who are dealing with the pandemic, and others such as the bosses of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), craftsmen and farmers.
Climate change is also on her agenda. “We must also succeed with ecological solutions, we must transform our lifestyles, transform our economy because the planet is our only refuge, the only source of life,” she said.
Anne Hidalgo is 62 years old. She has been mayor of Paris since 2014. The presidential election for the first rounds is scheduled for April 2022.
Gérard Rugambwa
