French president shakes up government, names new PM, after poor vote

PARIS -- French President François Hollande named a new prime minister Monday who will pick a fresh government after the ruling Socialists suffered a humiliating rout in local elections over the weekend.

“I have heard your message,” Hollande said in a televised mea culpa. “It is clear: not enough change, too slow; not enough jobs; too much unemployment; not enough social justice, too many taxes; not enough efficiency in public action; too many questions about the ability of our country to get out of this when it has so many attributes.

“I know the French feel forgotten, abandoned, relegated. This message has been sent to me personally, and it is up to me to reply.”

Hollande accepted the resignation of Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault and announced as his replacement Manuel Valls, who had been interior minister.

Valls is seen as one of the more conservative officials among the ruling Socialists and has been likened to Bill Clinton and Britain’s former Prime Minister Tony Blair. He has alienated many on the left of his party and its political allies. Some have described him as the left’s answer to former center-right President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Cecile Duflot, leader of the Ecology and Green party who had clashed with Valls in the past, announced that she was immediately stepping down as the government’s housing minister.

Hollande said he was appointing Valls to organize a government that was “strong ... and would fight for three objectives”: boosting the economy, increasing production and ensuring more “social justice.” He also promised to lower taxes.

The shake-up followed the Socialist’s weekend showing in local elections in which the ruling party lost about 150 towns to the opposition right and the far-right National Front.

There was no shortage of bad news for Hollande on Monday as official figures published by the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies showed France had cut its public deficit less quickly than planned. It fell to 4.3% of gross domestic product last year, missing the 4.1% target Hollande had set and a long way from the 3% demanded by the European Union by the end of next year. Brussels has already granted Paris two extra years to meet the limit.

Another Socialist government minister, Yamina Benguigui, was accused of lying on her declaration of assets and hiding investments in neighboring Belgium, which she denied.

Valls, 51, was born in Barcelona, Spain, the son of a Catalan painter and a Swiss Italian mother. He joined the Socialist Party at age 17 and took French nationality three years later.

He speaks four languages and has four children by his first wife. In 2010, he married violinist Anne Gravoin.

Willsher is a special correspondent.