Orkhan Sattarov, head of the European Bureau of VK
The results of the presidential elections in France brought no surprise: they confirmed public opinion polls conducted in advance. No miracle happened, and former president Nicolas Sarkozy yielded to his main opponent Hollande. Neither an active position in the Libyan campaign nor obduracy in the criminalization of non-recognition of genocides brought the desired victory to Sarkozy. However, Nicolas Sarkozy managed to leave his mark on the history of France – the first president who wasn’t reelected to a second term.
Thus, on May 15th Francois Hollande becomes the official president of France. And France's neighbors will have to take this into consideration, especially Germany, headed by the conservative government of Angela Merkel. Merkel completely supported Sarkozy in the election campaign. She even refused to meet Hollande ahead of the elections, even though the chancellor of Germany traditionally meets both main candidates for the French presidency. Sarkozy’s PR managers even find Merkel’s support to have been negative, as it badly influenced his ratings.
However, now it will be very difficult to ignore Hollande in Berlin. First of all, the future of European should be agreed on, and Merkel’s and Hollande’s views are very different on the issue. The stumbling block is that Hollande wants to reconsider the tax pact of the EU. Hollande stands for reconsideration and amendments to the document developed by Sarkozy and Merkel, while she opposes it heavily. And this theme will be central during talks between the leaders of France and Germany, which will take place in Berlin next week. “Madam Merkel will defiantly have questions about my program, and this is good. We will discuss it. Germany won’t define the fate of the whole of Europe,” Hollande said ahead of the elections.
During the coming meeting Hollande will insist that the tax pact should include measures on encouragement of European economic growth. However, nobody doubts that the leaders of the two major countries will be able to find a compromise. In the next summit of the EU heads in July we will probably see the first sketches of the “pact of growth” of the EU economies. The talks between Hollande and Merkel will define its shape. And it won’t be easy.
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