PARIS (Reuters) ? Francois Hollande will try to unseat France's conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy and return a Socialist to the Elysee Palace for the first time in 17 years in an election just over six months from now.
Hollande, a moderate who says France must balance its books without sacrificing the welfare state or shrinking the number of state-employed school teachers, won a U.S.-style primary ballot on Sunday to designate the Socialist Party's presidential challenger.
He scored victory over his more old-school rival Martine Aubry, a former labor minister, with more than 56 percent of the vote.
Although he has never held a national government post and is little known outside France, the notoriously witty Hollande, 57, says he expects and is ready for a "fierce battle" against the right and far-right in the months ahead.
"The right has nothing to lose," said the man who could be the first Socialist to win a presidential contest since the late Francois Mitterrand was re-elected in 1988.
Sarkozy has yet to declare but is widely expected to run for re-election after five years in office, where he has had to deal with the worst global economic downturn since World War Two and alienated many voters by cutting tax for the wealthy in tough times.
'MR NORMAL'
Hollande, tipped by pollsters to beat Sarkozy comfortably, rides to work on a scooter and sells himself as "Mr Normal" who will put a stop to the frenetic showbiz style that won Sarkozy the nickname of the "bling-bling" president.
"I measure the scale of the task awaiting me. It is vast. It is grave. I must rise to meet the aspirations of a French people who are sick and tired of the policies of Nicolas Sarkozy," Hollande told supporters on Sunday night.
For months, the opinion polls suggest French voters are ready to put the left back in the Elysee Palace and oust the unpopular Sarkozy.
The left's runaway favorite to become president had been former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn but his IMF career and presidential hopes foundered when he was arrested in New York in May on charges of sexually assaulting a hotel maid. The charges have since been dropped.
The ease with which Hollande and Aubry filled Strauss-Kahn's shoes as popular alternatives suggests many voters are simply weary of Sarkozy and his economic policies.
The Socialist Party had organized a two-round contest where anyone who paid a euro and declared allegiance to left-wing values could vote.
What remains to be seen now is whether or not Hollande reverses out of the more hardline stand he adopted in the closing stages of the Socialist primary as he sought to cater to people who had voted in large numbers in the opening round for anti-bank, anti-globalization contender Arnaud Montebourg.
Hollande, who promised in the final days of campaigning to crack down on banks and financial market excess, consolidated his position by securing the support of the four contenders knocked out in round one, including Montebourg.
The main tenet of the Socialist manifesto which will provide the backbone of Hollande's campaign is that some 50 billion euros of tax breaks and other concessions made by Sarkozy can be scrapped, with half of the proceeds funding more proactive policies for jobs and growth and the other half going into public deficit reduction.
(Reporting By Brian Love; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
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