French Socialists fail to choose leader

Former presidential candidate Segolene Royal, who lost to Nicolas Sarkozy in 2007, addressed party delegates yesterday. (Benoit Tessier/Reuters)

REIMS, France - France's main opposition party failed to select a new leader and promote a platform at an annual convention yesterday, plunging the party into disarray as it seeks to challenge President Nicolas Sarkozy in the 2012 election.

The Socialists will now put the matter to a vote among party members on Thursday, and again on Friday if a runoff is necessary. It will be the first time a Socialist leader is chosen by the rank-and-file without the backing of the party leadership.

The candidates to replace outgoing party chief Francois Hollande are former presidential candidate Segolene Royal, former labor minister Martine Aubry, and Benoit Hamon.

Royal was defeated by the conservative Sarkozy in the 2007 election, and Aubry gave France the 35-hour work week that Sarkozy is undoing. Hamon represents a far-left faction of the party.

Royal, 55, appealed in vain for unity behind her candidacy. She had won a pre-convention ballot with 29 percent of the vote and appealed to Hollande, her ex-companion and father of her four children, to back her candidacy.

But Hollande, who split with Royal last year, threw his support behind Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe.

Delanoe, in an effort to limit the chaos, decided not to add his name to the mix.

ASSOCIATED PRESS