By DPA,
Paris : The French would prefer German Chancellor Angela Merkel to become the European Union’s first official president rather than their own President Nicolas Sarkozy, according to a poll published Monday.
According to the survey, which was published by the online news daily Bakchich, one of four respondents said Merkel is the European personality “most suitable to become the first president of Europe”.
Sarkozy received only 17 percent of the poll’s votes, which left him in third position, trailing even former French president Valery Giscard d’Estaing, who previously headed the committee that drafted the dropped EU constitutional treaty.
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso was preferred by 14 percent of the respondents, ahead of Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero, 12 percent, and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, with 4 percent.
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi brought up the rear, with just one percent support.
The survey, published by the online news daily Bakchich, was carried out by the OpinionWay institute on May 6-7 using a representative sample of 1,068 adults aged 18 and above.