Last update - 00:00 30/09/2007
I am the state
He is constantly in motion. Even when he sits in his office, he shifts his legs nervously. His interlocutors have a hard time completing a sentence before he interrupts them. He does not stop working for a moment. When having a meal with visitors, he does not hesitate to run to his office to examine a document or talk on the phone. Whenever possible, he prefers to walk rather than ride. Like his predecessor, he also needs an extra portion of love and admiration.
Not a day or even an hour passes without hearing or seeing him. One time it is about a new reform, another time a new project or program. All are the handiwork of Nicolas Sarkozy. Lionel Jospin, the former prime minister, described this constant presence as "intolerable" and "nerve-racking."
France has never witnessed a phenomenon like this. Last Thursday, in a special interview with France's two main TV channels, he was asked where he gets his energy. "I was not elected to take a siesta," he retorted. "I was elected to work and deliver the goods, and I intend to work from morning till evening for five years, up until the last moment."
The French are not used to such a pace. President Francois Mitterand liked to slip into philosophic moods, and his successor, Jacques Chirac, was careful to accommodate French self-indulgence and was cautious about implementing reforms.
But with Sarkozy's dizzying pace it is doubtful whether people will speak about past presidents or even remember them.
It is already clear that most French people do not know who the prime minister, defense minister or interior minister are. They are under the impression that Sarkozy has conducted a coup, albeit through democratic means, and has taken control of their lives. He handles, in an almost personal way, every problem that arises.
In the domestic arena, he is generating a real revolution and shaping a new social road map.
He aims to relieve the state of its exclusive responsibility for funding social services. This generosity has brought the state's economy to "the brink of bankruptcy," as Prime Minister Francois Fillon described it this week in a debate in the National Assembly.
From now on, every French person will have to finance part of the expenditures on education and health. Employees' retirement age will rise by at least two years.
The work week, which was shortened to 35 hours, will again be at least 40 hours. The heaviest price will be paid by the health sector, which has a deficit of 7 billion euros - part of a 12-billion-euro deficit in the basket of social services.
The result will be a cut in subsidies for medicine, fewer free-of-charge hospitalization days and a payment of two euros per patient for using the ambulance services.
Nonetheless, the new budget that was submitted to parliament this week includes a proposal to impose a tax on the stock market and use these new revenues to finance health.
Employees in certain sectors who enjoyed arrangements that allowed them to retire at age 50 - railroad and Metro workers, for example - will have to wait a little longer.
The number of immigrants allowed to enter the country will be substantially reduced and those who wish to reunite with family members who have already become French citizens will have to undergo DNA testing to prove their blood relation.
At this stage, the French are very excited about this Napoleon who descended upon them and has shaken up their lives.
In a country where the very term "reform" is considered an enemy to be nipped in the bud, Sarkozy has succeeded in forcing his countrymen to think differently about the value of work, social welfare and compensation.
How long will he be able to continue? Will he have the strength to hold up?
He has a decisive majority in the National Assembly and a decisive majority in the general public. Sometimes it seems that since Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette there has not been as dominant a pair as Nicolas and his wife Cecilia.
However, some loud voices are already being heard from both within and outside his party, complaining about Sarkozy's imperiousness and the personality cult that surrounds him.
They wonder whether this explosion of energy will exhaust them and they fear the French people will ultimately become sick and tired of his constant presence.