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Valls rules out standing against Hollande in French left presidential primary

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls on Monday promised not to stand in primaries against President François Hollande for the Socialist candidate in next year's presidential election amid speculation that he might resign and announce his candidacy.

French Prime Minister Manuel Vallsand President François Hollande after lunching together
French Prime Minister Manuel Vallsand President François Hollande after lunching together Reuters/Christian Hartmann
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There will be "no confrontation in a primary between the president of the republic and the prime minister", Valls said on a trip to Tunisia where he was to open an investors' conference on Tuesday.

Before leaving Paris Valls had lunch with Hollande having given his strongest suggestion yet that he was planning to seek the presidency .

As the mainstream right chose its candidate in a primary on Sunday he told a newspaper he was “getting ready” and that he would have a better chance given Hollande’s record low approval ratings and the disarray on the left.

Hollande has yet to announce whether he will stand for reelection and Valls could still resign, so his statement after the meeting remains ambiguous.

But the prime minister said that it was "out of the question that there should be a constitutional crisis" and said that his meeting with the president had been "calm".

Left divided before primary

Socialist Party spokesman Olivier Faure begged to differ saying that if Valls ran, it would be tantamount to "collective suicide", adding that "the left would be eliminated for a long time". 

If opinion polls are to be trusted, neither Valls nor Hollande would make it past the first round next April.   

On the left, two presidential hopefuls - former economy minister Emmanuel Macron, who has set up his own centrist party, and hard-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon -- have decided to go it alone, and will not be taking part in the left-wing primary organised by the Socialists in January.

Socialist Party national secretary Jean-Christophe Cambadélis appealed to "all left-wing voters" to take part in the primary to avoid "dispersal" of the left in the 2017 election.

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