France is gearing up for presidential elections in which French-Africans and French-Arabs will play a key role, writes Eva Dadrian The race for the French presidency, with elections scheduled for 22 April, effectively kicked off last Sunday when Ségolène Royal, candidate of the Socialist Party, unveiled her platform on economic policy. Pledging to raise pensions, to increase the minimum wage to 1500 Euros a month, to increase the construction of low-rent housing, to guarantee jobs or further training for all youths within six months of graduating from university, to offer free contraception to young women, to ensure all young people have access to 10,000 Euros interest-free loans, and that the handicapped to see their benefits rise, Royal declared to a rapturous and euphoric audience, "Today I offer you a presidential pact: 100 proposals for France to rediscover a shared ambition, pride and fraternity," adding, "With me, politics will never again happen without you." Observers were quick to notice that Royal's 100-proposal platform was reminiscent of the 110 proposals that helped late President François Mitterrand, her mentor and the politician whose patronage was key to her ascent in politics, to get into the Elysée Palace in 1981. Raising the sensitive issue of the suburbs -- or les banlieues -- where in 2005 a series of violent riots erupted sending shockwaves throughout the country, the 56-year old single mother of four declared, "I want for the children in these suburbs what I want for my own children." Binding together the two most controversial issues of French internal and foreign politics -- high unemployment among second- generation immigrants, and immigration -- Royal seemed to strike a chord with both the African and Arab communities in France. According to a poll conducted by Louis- Harris last month, however, support for Nicolas Sarkozy, the officially nominee of the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), and Royal's main rival, increased in by two points in a week with 33 per cent of respondents saying they would vote for him in April. Although born in Dakar, Royal has little knowledge of Africa. Trying to even out France's relations with Algeria, she wrote to President Abdel Aziz Bouteflika, that if elected, her first priority would be "to set up strong relations between our two countries, for I feel we can upgrade our cooperative relations," emphasising that she considered colonialism "ascendancy, looting and a contemptuous system". Political analysts say Royal may pick up points from this position, since discord between Algiers and Paris on the repercussions of French colonialism in Algeria, and France's refusal to apologise for crimes committed during the French occupation of 1830 to 1962, has been holding back a signature of friendship between the two countries. On the other hand, Ségolène may lose a cache of votes because many French of Algerian origin resent any "rapprochement" with what they deem "the dictatorial and criminal regime" in Algeria. On other hand, nothing indicates, for the time being, that these votes would swing to Sarkozy. Recently Sarkozy opted to stand by the very French principle of "freedom of speech" and chose to back Philippe Val, editor of the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, accused of re-publishing insulting and racist Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed that caused fury in the Arab and Muslim world a year ago. Adding insult to injury, Charlie Hebdo also published one of its own drawings, which showed the Prophet holding his head in his hands with the caption: "It's hard to be loved by idiots." With libel proceedings being brought by La Grande Mosquée de Paris, Sarkozy's intervention has infuriated many leading members of the French Muslim Council that he, himself, created. While eager to be seen as a reformer of the UMP, Sarkozy has infuriated Afro-French voters by adopting a draconian position on immigration. In order to curb illegal immigration, mainly African, he pushed in parliament an immigration bill that gives residency permit only to "skilled and talented" migrants. Other measures of this infamous bill include longer delays for foreign spouses to obtain residency cards, compulsion to learn French, and the necessity to sign a "contract" pledging to respect the French way of life. Sarkozy's speech in Benin last year in which he said, "We have to build a new relationship, cleaner, free of complexes, balanced, clear of the dregs of the past and of obsolescent ideas that remain on both sides of the Mediterranean," was booed by hundreds of demonstrators in Cotonou, and in Bamako protesters shouted, "Racist, out of our country!" and "Go home!"
