Socialists win in Paris elections

PARIS, France -- Socialists have won a majority of seats in Paris municipal elections, ending more than 100 years of conservative rule in the capital.

But Prime Minister Lionel Jospin's Socialists suffered defeat in the provinces, losing almost 30 towns to right-wing rivals.

Final results gave the Socialist alliance under Bertrand Delanoe, an unassuming 50-year-old senator, 92 of the 163 seats on the Paris council.

Thousands of Parisians partied late into the night on Sunday and Socialists also danced in the streets in Lyon, the second large city to oust conservative incumbents just one year before Jospin is due to challenge Jacques Chirac for the presidency.

"We've got the keys, we've got the keys," chanted jubilant crowds outside Paris City Hall as they jangled their keychains to mark the historic victory of Delanoe.

ALSO Profile: Bertrand Delanoe Key issues in Paris

Until Sunday's run-off, Paris had been governed by the right for 130 years and Lyon for almost a century.

The left actually fell just short of a majority of votes in Paris, but it was victorious because divisions in the rightist voting lists and the constituency electoral system meant that it was able to take the majority of seats.

"Paris saves the left," the left-wing daily Liberation headlined its front page. "Opposition wave submerges provincial towns," the conservative Le Figaro wrote.

"Today, Parisians have freely decided in favour of change in the capital," said Bertrand Delanoe, the Socialist Party's candidate, in a victory speech at his campaign headquarters.

Philippe Seguin, official candidate of Chirac's RPR party, took 55 seats on the Paris council, with 13 going to the scandal-tainted outgoing mayor Jean Tiberi and three to other right-wing forces.

"This is a good local result in Paris, it is a good local result in Lyon, and then we have also had some failures which we are going to have to think about," Jospin said as he went to congratulate his friend Delanoe.

The result marked a personal blow for Chirac, who served as mayor for 18 years until his election as president in 1995.

Chirac's successor Tiberi was dumped by the RPR party after allegations of cronyism, vote-rigging and sleaze.

But his bitter rivalry with Seguin, a former speaker of parliament, helped the left reconquer the city.

Mayoral elections were held in more than 36,000 villages, towns and cities across France, over two rounds on March 11 and 18.

In Lyon, Socialist Gerard Colomb beat an alliance between the RPR and centrist Charles Millon, treated as a pariah by many voters for once forging an alliance with the far right.

The left lost its bid to oust conservatives from control in Toulouse, where victory went to Philippe Douste-Blazy, one of Chirac's most ardent supporters in the centrist UDF party.

The left also lost an estimated 27 major towns it had held until Sunday, including Strasbourg, Rouen and Orleans, while it won just nine.

Education Minister Jack Lang lost his post as mayor of the town of Blois, while Employment Minister Elisabeth Guigou and European Affairs Minister Pierre Moscovici both slumped to big defeats in their bids to unseat conservative incumbents.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Left on course for Paris victory
March 18, 2001
France goes to the polls
March 11, 2001

Lyon City Hall
Paris City Hall
Toulouse City Hall
Socialist Party (in French)
RPR (in French)
Communist Party (in French)
Green Party (in French)
Le Figaro (in French)
Libération (in French)

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