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EVA JOLY

Eva Joly is French green candidate for presidency

Eva Joly, a Norwegian-French magistrate who once led a probe into one of France's biggest corruption scandals, was on Tuesday elected the French green party's candidate for next year's presidential vote.

Published: 13 July 2011 11:11 CEST

Eva Joly is French green candidate for presidency

N4thaniel

Joly took 58 percent of the vote in a party primary, far ahead of the 41 percent of votes cast for Nicolas Hulot, a television presenter and the best-known face of the environmental movement in France.

The 67-year-old will now line up as her Green-Europe Ecology party’s candidate against right-wing President Nicolas Sarkozy if, as expected, he stands again in the 2012 election.

Joly promised after her victory in the party’s primary vote was announced that she would be the candidate of “the France that does not accept discrimination or ghettos, of those who believe that fraternity is our most precious good.”

Joly was a dynamic examining magistrate whose probes into the Elf oil company’s affairs in the 1990s Africa was an inspiration for Claude Chabrol’s film “L’Ivresse du pouvoir” (Comedy of Power).

Born Gro Eva Farseth in Norway, she came to France to work as an au pair at the age of 17 and later studied law in her adopted country.

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Joint leader of Sweden's Green Party announces resignation

The decision comes less than three weeks after Stenevi took an indefinite period of sick leave, saying that she needed time to recover after a bruising period that saw the party launch an internal investigation into complaints about her management style.

There has also been extensive press coverage over the alleged conflict she has with Daniel Hellden, the man chosen as the party’s other leader at a conference in November.

“This is a very difficult decision,” Stenevi told the Aftonbladet newspaper. “I put myself forward for reelection and received a renewed mandate from the congress, but I don’t believe I can be my best self right now and I don’t really know how long it will take to get back on my feet.”

“The party deserves better than to be in some kind of limbo, where one of the spokespeople [as the party calls its leaders] cannot fully carry out the role. And I need to focus on getting better again, being a good mum and a pleasant partner.”

Writing on Instagram, Stenevi’s joint leader Daniel Helldén said that he was sorry to see Stenevi go.

“I have respect for her decision, but personally I think it’s a real shame. I have very much enjoyed working together with Märtha,” he said.

Stenevi said that the leaks to the media about complaints about her management style in the autumn had been difficult for her to handle.

“It put me under enormous pressure. It wasn’t the media attention: I understand that you are going to be continually criticised and investigated, but what happened in the autumn was that there was a lot of anonymous briefing, so you didn’t know who you could trust or where it was coming from, and that made it much more difficult and much more draining.”

When Stenevi went on sick leave last month, the party’s secretary, Katrin Wissing, told TT that her relationship with Daniel Helldén had not played a role in her departure.

“On the contrary, Daniel has been giving Märta extremely good support,” she said.

Although Stenevi is resigning as party leader, she intends to remain in parliament is an MP, and has not decided to give up her career in politics.

“When I’m back on track, I’ll see what happens, but I don’t feel completely finished with politics,” she said. “But this is the right decision, both for me, my family and my party.”

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