Nicolas Sarkozy, the immediate past president of France, has been elected as the head of the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), the main opposition party in the country.
Though he was expected to secure 70% in order to keep alive his hope of being reelected as president, Sarkozy polled 64.5%, ahead of Bruno Le Maire, who served as a minister under him and Hervé Mariton, a member of France’s national assembly.
While Maire had 29.2%, Mariton managed to poll 6.3%.
The former president’s popularity has waned among members of UMP, according to Reuters.
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In 2014, when Sarkozy first became the chairman of UMP, he won 85 percent of the vote and went on to become the country’s president.
However, he lost his reelection bid to incumbent François Hollande of Socialist party on May 6 2012 and retired from politics temporarily.
Sarkozy has come a long way in French politics. He held different strategic positions in the government of Jacque Chirac, his predecessor.
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Between May 2002 and March 2004, he was the minister of interior and was appointed minister of finances from March 2004 to May 2005. He returned to the ministry of interior in 2005 and remained there until he was elected president in 2007.
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