French weekly magazines review

But I'd like to start with Le Point which carries the most interesting investigation shedding light on all of the parties. Infiltrators for the magazine have revealed that there are freemasons in nearly all of the major parties.

This in itself is not necessarily a bad thing, there are 150,000 French people who are members of this secret society.

But the magazine insists that the network of ministers, public company bosses, bosses of big business (CAC 40, the 40 strongest businesses in France) and any influential NGO's are part of this network.

And this throws into question the democratic process. There seems to be no mention of journalists who are sometimes seen as too close to power in France.

In each of the political camps there are freemasons, except, interestingly, the National Front, at least for now.

Le Point's informers seem to think that far left-wing freemasons want to invite far right-wing National Front into the freemasons. This is because the ultra-secular lefties appreciate the islamophobic stance of the National Front.

I won't go too far into the details of who in power is implicated, but suffice to say that they all deny involvement in this society, which has been around for centuries.

I would, however, like to mention one other facet of this story in Le Point. It links the freemasons to the prostitution-ring scandal in Lille in the north of France.

May big names on both sides of the political spectrum have been linked to this affair, including DSK, as well as many high-ranking police officers.

But the details remain very hazy and various officials have shifted sideways from their jobs. Le Point believes this is related to the oath of freemasons to stick together so the story does not come out in the press and indeed make it to the courts.

Dossier: The Strauss-Kahn affair rocks France, IMF

Centrist L'Express, aims to give a true assessment of Sarkozy's performance as president, but say that it is a difficult excercise due to the crisis which has hung over his presidency and his somewhat aggressive methods which are difficult to untangle from results.

For L'Express, this presidency's main success is the intevention in Libya, which France pushed for. One of the biggest flops was trying to build a Mediterarranean alliance with countries such as Syria and Egypt, before the Arab Spring.

So probably an initiative that Sarkozy does not want to be reminded of!

Weekly satirical paper Le Canard enchainé picks up on Sarkozy's trip to Guyana this week, where he was pictured in a dugout boat. Many of the papers have photos of him, with the interior minister dthe environment minister in the boat with him.

The Canard, however, carries a cartoon of Sarko saying he started his presidency in a yacht and ended up in a dugout. They are of course referencing the hoo ha after he was spotted holidaying in his billionaire friend's yacht during the crisis.

Left-wing Marianne sticks with the theme of Sarkozy on their front cover proclaiming there is panic in the presidential palace, the Elysée. The tone of their coverage is almost gleeful because the incumbent president, who is yet to announce his candidacy, is in such hot waters.

Marianne does worry, however, that the troubles in the UMP party will only be to the advantage of the far-right National Front.

On it's front page Marianne somewhat poignantly places an investigation which suggests that over eight million out of 65 million French people live on less than 1000 euros a month.

They interview several people in that predicament. A clever positioning of the Sarkozy story and this investigation.

But Socialist Party presidential candidate, François Hollande does no get off scott free either though Marianne questions whether his programme is too sensible. So it goes to show that there is no pleasing some people!

A little food for thought also about the state of left-wing politics. Marianne claims there are no real intellectuals guiding the Left in France anymore, like philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre did up until the 1980s.

The magazine says this dearth of intellectual debate over how society should be run is leaving the 'indignes' movement worldwide a bit lost.

Le Nouvel Observateur is pushing the election theme even farther, wondering about the first hundred days of the presidency of Hollande. They say it would be 'a blitz'!

So Sarkozy is having a bit of a battering in the weeklies. But there is still time between now and the first round of the elections in April.

Le Nouvel Observateur carries another important story from this week in France, as do many of the weeklies, that is the death of four more French soldiers in Afghanistan.

France's FM has called into question the country's continuing participation in the war .But Nouvel Obs points out this will jeopardise the task of training over 300,000 Afghan soldiers and police to take over the task of security.

There is a rather defeatist tone to the article, which concludes by saying that the rhetoric in Washington and Paris about withdrawing is only encouraging the Taliban and undermining troop confidence.

Côte d'Ivoire president Alassane Outarra was on a diplomatic visit to Paris this week.

Meanwhile, L'Express sent a special envoy to assess the situation in Duékoué in the west of the country where some of the worst post-electoral violence took place early last year.

The journalist reports that although there is much talk of reconciliation in the country, the wounds have not yet started to heal.

Le Nouvel Observateur carries an amusing article about the state of etiquette in France. The French, it says, pride themselves on good manners, but is this art on the decline?

They point out last year the Paris metro system ran an awareness campaign on its trains and stations about appropriate behaviour. And Sarkozy gets a further bashing in the press as he is cited as a bad role model.

They quote his famous 'Casse-toi pauvre con' line, whereby he told a man on the street to 'get lost' in no uncertain terms. But never fear-help is at hand! An etiquette manual has been published. 'Etiquette for dummies' has already sold over 10,000 copies.

On an entirely different note, a quick story in Marianne, about the startled passengers on a Paris-Marseille train who discovered they were sharing a compartment with a two-metre long boa constricter.

The snake slunk around the legs of passengers before finally slithering into the air conditioning overhead. Some passengers reported that they did feel something sliding past their legs but took no notice. The boa, which can squeeze people to death, was finally reunited with its owner.