French leaders’ poll ratings soar after Charlie Hebdo attacks

French President François Hollande and Prime Minister Manuel Valls have enjoyed a record leap in popularity in the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attacks, which sparked appeals for "national unity" and massive demonstrations in Paris and the rest of the country.

François Hollande visits Tulle, the town of which he used to be mayor, on Saturday AFP

Responding to the question “Do you agree or disagree with François Hollande’s actions as president of the republic?” 40 per cent of the 1,003 people contacted gave a positive

response.

That’s a leap of 21 per cent from Hollande’s historic low in the polls taken before Islamist gunmen attacked the satirical paper’s offices and a kosher supermarket when he was showing the lowest-ever recorded score for a serving president largely thanks to record unemployment and a sluggish economy.

Valls’s rating rose 17 per cent to 61 per cent, higher even than when he took office.

The last such leap for a French president was François Mitterrand’s 19 point rise when the first Gulf War was declared in 1991.

The first such opinion poll in France was taken in 1958.