French President, Francois Hollande dumps first lady
French President Francois Hollande on Saturday
told AFP he has split with his longstanding partner Valerie Trierweiler
after his affair with an actress nearly 20 years his junior.
The announcement came after a day
of rumours in the French media that Hollande would formally announce the
rupture on Saturday, on the eve of a visit by Trierweiler to India for
charity work.
Saying he was speaking as a
private individual and not as head of state as the matter concerned his
private life, Hollande told AFP over the phone: “I wish to make it known
that I have ended my partnership with Valerie Trierweiler.”
Trierweiler, 48, had been
convalescing at a presidential residence in Versailles outside Paris
after leaving hospital last Saturday, where she was treated for what was
described as fatigue brought on by press revelations of Hollande's
affair with 41-year-old actress Julie Gayet.
Trierweiler is due to fly to
Mumbai on Sunday for a charity trip organised by French relief
organisation
Action Against Hunger (ACF), in her first public appearance
since the scandal broke two weeks ago.
An ACF spokeswoman told AFP the trip “was confirmed this morning by Ms. Trierweiler's office.”
Hollande,
59, announced his separation from Segolene Royal, a senior member of
his Socialist party and a presidential candidate in 2007, just after she
lost the election to Nicolas Sarkozy.
He then started living openly with
Trierweiler. Though she is not married to Hollande, she assumed the
role of First Lady at official functions after Hollande's election in
2012.
There was no immediate comment from Trierweiler after the announcement of the split.
On Saturday, the popular Le
Parisien daily carried a story on its website declaring “C'est Fini”
(It's Over), adding that the Elysee Palace would release a statement
shortly.
“Hollande, who took the initiative
for the separation, wanted to make it official before Valerie
Trierweiler's departure for India,” the Journal du Dimanche weekly said
on its website.
After Hollande's confirmation of
the split, Le Parisien said on its website that Trierweiler had left the
presidential retreat near the chateau of Versailles on Saturday for
their apartment in Paris's middle-class 15th arrondissement.
The Journal du Dimanche said the couple had worked out the modalities of the split at a lunch on Thursday.
Hollande had promised at a
mid-January news conference that he would publicly define what
relationship, if any, he and Trierweiler had before a February 11 state
visit to the United States.
US President Barack Obama “looks
forward to seeing President Hollande as planned,” National Security
Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden told AFP on Saturday, without further
comment.
Hollande's announcement comes
after a spat between Trierweiler and her lawyer Frederique Giffard, who
said Thursday that her client was aware that a “clarification” on her
tangled situation was due.
But Trierweiler reacted furiously to the lawyer's remarks and chastened Giffard for speaking without her permission.
Trierweiler is a glamorous,
twice-divorced career journalist who has three children of her own and
has been Hollande's partner for the best part of a decade.
She
emerged into the spotlight before he was elected president, and warned
that she would not be a wallflower, saying in April 2012: “I have
character, they cannot muzzle me.”
That was quickly proven when
Trierweiler tweeted her support in legislative elections for an
independent rival of Royal, someone with whom the first lady did not
have warm relations.
The tweet went down badly in
France, and Trierweiler's reputation suffered, with many deeming her
somewhat arrogant. A recent poll said she was the least-liked French
First Lady in modern history.
After Hollande's election,
Trierweiler cut down on her work at the French magazine Paris-Match and
engaged in charitable activities.
Trierweiler has not commented on
the latest scandal since French glossy Closer broke news of Hollande's
affair with Gayet on January 10, splashing photos of a man resembling
Hollande arriving for alleged trysts at a flat near the Elysee Palace on
a scooter.
She only tweeted after being released from hospital on January 19 to thank her supporters.
Hollande
is the second French president to split from his partner while in
office. In 2007, his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy divorced his wife
Cecilia and married former supermodel and singer Carla Bruni the
following year.
Hollande, who is France's least
popular president according to opinion polls, has never denied an affair
with Gayet but has so far steadfastly refused to answer questions about
his love life, simply saying that he and Trierweiler were going through
a “difficult time.” - AFP
