Now controversial French first lady Valerie Trierweiler may host her own TV show

French first lady Valerie Trierweiler is at the centre of another furious debate about her role after it was revealed she may be about to host her own TV show. 
The 47-year-old lover of President Francois Hollande is regularly accused of a conflict of interest because she remains on the staff of the glossy celebrity magazine Paris Match.

Ms Trierweiler has her own office and staff at the Elysee Palace, with critics suggesting that she should choose between being the partner of a head-of-state and a journalist.

Job offer: Valerie Trierweiler (pictured here with her lover, France's president Francois Hollande, right, during a visit to the Louvre in Paris on Wednesday) has been offered a role presenting a programme on French TV

Power: Ms Trierweiler (right) has been accused of having a conflict of interest as First Lady to President Hollande (left) because of her job as a journalist. Commentators now fear a new role in TV will give her even more influence

Influence: Ms Trierweiler (pictured here on the right with Culture minister Aurelie Filippetti) was at the Louvre to attend the opening of new galleries for the Department of Islamic Arts

But today Canal Plus confirmed ‘informal contact’ with Ms Trierweiler to discuss hosting a cultural programme every two months.

She has TV experience, having worked on a similar Saturday programme on Direct 8 in the past.

One of her earliest assignments, in 1992, involved securing an exclusive interview with Segolene Royal, a minister and Mr Hollande’s then girlfriend, after she had given birth to the couple’s daughter.

The interview, broadcast from a hospital, was later found to have been set up by Mr Hollande, to the annoyance of Ms Royal, who was too tired and drugged-up to complain.

 

Now Ms Royal and Ms Trierweiler are even more bitter enemies, after Ms Trierweiler sent an infamous tweet supporting one of Ms Royal’s political rivals to win a parliamentary seat.

Ms Royal went on to lose the election, accusing Ms Trierweiler of stabbing her in the back, and effectively ending her political career. 
Now French commentators fear that Ms Trierweiler will have even more influence, despite the fact that she has never been elected.

Ms Trierweiler (seen her with Minister for Industrial Recovery Arnaud Montebourg at the Department of Islamic Arts) has been a controversial figure since Mr Hollande was elected president

In response to the growing scandal, Bruno Roger-Petit, the distinguished Paris political analyst, said that Ms Trierweiler’s proposed programme could easily include ‘artists’ who back Francois Hollande politically.
Mr Roger-Petit said that even a cultural progamme was ‘deeply political’ and that ‘it is perhaps time to define a legal framework to give status to the partner of the President of the Republic.’   
Despite her work for Paris Match, Ms Trierweiler has had no hesitation in going to court whenever she is featured in rival publications.
Earlier this month she won damages from a magazine which published pictures of her in a bikini – even though Paris Match also used them.

The farcical situation saw a judge at the Tribunal de Grande Instance in Paris order VSD, another celebrity glossy, to pay Ms Trierweiler the equivalent of 1500 pounds.

Paris Match is full of pictures of public figures on the beach every week, but Ms Trierweiler objected to another publication capturing a swim she enjoyed with Mr Hollande in August.

Ms Trierweiler would not comment on her  plans to take on TV work today.