French press review 9 January 2014

Is François Hollande really a liberal-socialist and the forgotten war in Sudan dominate the front page stories of French dailies.

Is François Hollande a socialist, a liberal, a liberal-socialist, or even a social democrat? And should we care?

The first of those is the question on the front page of Le Monde this morning, where we learn that Hollande's current political vision is close to that of Tony Blair and Gerhard Schroeder, with the crucial differences that those guys were at the peak of their power in the 1990s, and that the French president has not yet got past the talking phase. A political vision is all very fine, says Le Monde, but voters will want to see clear and concrete results.

The problem is more than a question of terminology, since many socialists regard liberalism as the mother of all evils, and won't easily accept any softening. Hollande was first secretary of the Socialist Party when then French prime minister Lionel Jospin defended social democratic orthodoxy against the nasty liberal sliding of Blair and Schroeder. Hollande is unlikely to want to turn his back on that part of his heritage, continues Le Monde.

At least we now know what opposition leader Jean-François Copé thinks of the presidential propositions. It's a trap, says Copé in Le Figaro, and an insult to French businesses. Offering a "responsibility pact" to the bosses clearly suggests that they have not been responsible up to now, and that's simply not good enough, fumes Copé.

And it's so typical of Hollande, the opposition leader goes on. Remember the "diary for change," the "development agenda," the "tool box," the "simplification shake-up," and the "pact of confidence"? Those are all previous versions of the presidential promise, none of them yielding anything in real terms, says Copé.

And the UMP leader takes an almost biblical turn, warning the captains of industry to maintain their vigilance and not be bought off for "a plate of lentils".

Copé is to have lunch with former president Nicolas Sarkozy tomorrow. You can bet lentils won't be on the menu.

The French press has finally woken up to the fact that there's a civil war in progress in South Sudan.

Libération gives front page prominence to what it calls "The forgotten war," suggesting that the conflicts in Mali and the Central African Republic have distracted at least French attention from what could well degenerate into another Rwanda, according to the Libé editorial.