An Ahmedabad-style toast to François Hollande win in France

While socialist party leader and newly-elected French president, François Hollande raises a toast to his victory in the presidential polls, the prez must also thank French-cum-Amdavadi citizen, Pascal Chazot who made a significant contribution to Hollande’s victory march.

As an Elected Member of Parliament for French overseas, Chazot was the official representative of Hollande in India.

Talking about the preparations and how he managed to get people to vote during the widely publicised elections, Chazot said, “There were two tough rounds in election for both candidates, Francois Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy. But Hollande defeated the incumbent President Sarkozy during Sunday’s decisive runoff by winning 52% votes.”

Hollande, who will take charge of the highest office from May 15, received votes from French citizens living in India too. These votes were being cast at the respective French consulates.

Talking about these votes, Chazot said: “I had to motivate people to go and vote in this poll as the participation in polls is critical from their end. I remained in constant touch with almost all the people here explaining them how lucky they were as they had a chance to vote compared to other countries where people are not able to exercise their voting rights.”

Chazot said that 60% of French people living in India and registered for voting came forward to vote for the current elections. While in French overseas, Sarkozy won by 53% and Hollande received only 47% votes, in India Hollande received 51% votes and Sarkozy managed to gather only 49% votes.