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Gay politician captures Paris
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FROM the political shadows, Bertrand Delanoe has burst into the bright lights in France after leading the left to a historic victory on Sunday in Paris which was confirmed on Monday morning by the elections office.
An unassuming, openly gay Socialist, Delanoe's win sends political tremors through this traditionally conservative, moneyed city where humility is passe and attitude de rigueur.
As crowds cheered and chanted his name, Delanoe made an acceptance speech on Sunday after provisional results showed him winning the City Hall.
In a campaign short on sound bites and long on denunciations of a corruption-tainted system, the 50-year-old senator turned the political tide with his simple slogan ``Let's change eras.''
Delanoe struck a chord with Paris' two million residents by focusing his campaign on improving the quality of life, including promising to reduce pollution in this often smoggy city. He also said he would address concerns about the city's poor, outlying suburbs.
Delanoe may also have won favour with voters disillusioned by the whiff of corruption and bitter infighting that has tainted President Jacques Chirac's conservative Rally for the Republic party in recent months.
``Today, Parisians freely chose change in the capital,'' Delanoe told supporters at his campaign headquarters. ``Tonight, hearts are moved among all those who for so long dreamed of putting Paris back on the road of the future, the road of imagination and of hope.''
In his public demeanor, Delanoe is a man like his patron - Lionel Jospin, France's dry, professorial prime minister. The two men are good friends.
One of a handful of openly gay politicians in still-conservative France, Delanoe revealed his homosexuality on a television programme in 1999. The unusual revelation did not cause many waves, as he was still a relative unknown - despite a long career in public life, often at the heart of the Socialists' political machine.
The new mayor is a keen supporter of gay issues, taking part in Gay Pride marches and campaigning for a controversial law to give some legal rights to unmarried couples, including same-sex couples.
Critics on the right have dubbed him a member of Paris' ``caviar left'' - well-to-do Socialists who live the life of the bourgeoisie in the city's chic southern neighbourhoods.
Like his mentor, Delanoe prides himself on his commitment to strict honesty but also, like Jospin, he has been criticized for lacking charisma - a charge friends say is false.
``He is a bon vivant. He loves going to restaurants, being surrounded by his friends, laughing, having a good time,'' said Evelyne Schapira, who has been friends with Delanoe for 27 years.
``I always saw him as someone with charisma. He is a powerful orator and he has a way of speaking that is beyond the ordinary,'' Schapira said.
Delanoe works out at home and likes soccer, especially local team Paris Saint-Germain. He smokes thin cigars and loves walking in Paris.
Born in Tunis, in Tunisia, in 1950, Delanoe still visits the North African country each year.
He joined the Socialist party in 1972, was noticed by party leader Francois Mitterrand, and, at age 29, was quickly elevated to the party's directing board.
He became party spokesman between 1981-83 but took a break from politics in 1986 to concentrate on his private business activities, keeping just his Paris seat.
(SD-Agencies)
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