France’s former president Nicolas Sarkozy has seized on the aftermath of the UK’s Brexit vote to try to style himself as the best candidate to represent the right in next year’s French presidential election.
Sarkozy – who supported the UK remaining in the EU and warned during the campaign that Brexit would be a catastrophe for Britain – is now seizing on the uncertainty to try to win over voters on the French right, portraying himself as the best person to deal with a crisis.
Sarkozy, 61, served one term as French president before being beaten by the Socialist François Hollande in 2012. He now wants another chance at the presidency but must first face a primary race in November in which supporters of the right and centre-right will choose their candidate.
In the wake of the EU referendum result, Sarkozy organised a trip to London this week where he sought to reassure a rally of hundreds of nervous French citizens, many of whom supported his party.
Invoking his self-styled image as an international troubleshooter who as president faced troubles such as the 2008 financial crisis, he said European leaders must now turn Brexit “into an opportunity to change Europe”.
Sarkozy has suggested the EU should be completely refounded with a new treaty and a rewrite of the Schengen accords, which allow for border-free travel. He wants a “Schengen 2” that limits free circulation to European citizens only. He has said that after such a treaty is agreed it should be voted on in referendums across the EU.
Several of Sarkozy’s rivals for the rightwing candidacy – including his key opponent, the more moderate Alain Juppé, a former prime minister – have also put forward ideas on refounding the EU and seeking public approval for it at some point in the future.
Juppé has led the primary polls for more than a year and remains more popular than Sarkozy among the general public. But in recent days polls have shown that Sarkozy’s popularity has risen sharply among members of his own Les Républicains party, who will play a crucial role in choosing the right’s presidential candidate this autumn.
“The current situation serves [Sarkozy] better than anyone else: whether it’s Brexit or the disorder of [France], he personifies the authority that voters on the right are waiting for,” Éric Woerth, the party’s general secretary, told Le Figaro.
Sarkozy is not expected to officially launch his primary campaign until the end of August.
With the far-right Front National’s Marine Le Pen expected to reach the final round of the presidential race next spring, Sarkozy has ramped up his long-running hardline rhetoric on the divisive issue of national identity in order to appeal to her voters.
He told a rally last month: “It wasn’t that long ago that when we talked about immigration, identity and removing citizenship we were called fascists. But minds have changed, the masses are rising, the people are standing up and they are saying louder and louder: ‘Enough is enough.’”
