Their on-off relationship enthralled voters before his election victory in May, but fears are now being raised that Cécilia Sarkozy, the President’s flighty wife, may be harming his office.

As if standing up President Bush and his wife while on a bridge-building visit to America was not enough, this week Mrs Sarkozy pulled out of a visit to Bulgaria, where she was to have been honoured for her role in helping to free medical workers from a Libyan jail.

Questions are now being asked as to why she refuses to be seen by the President’s side, and rumours of marital strife have returned to the Élysée Palace. It emerged yesterday that all ministers have now been banned from posing for media photographs alongside their spouses.

Mrs Sarkozy, 49, was being awaited with excitement before a presidential trip to Sofia, where she was regarded as the “saviour” who brought home imprisoned medical workers from Libya. Hours before the trip she cancelled, leaving “Super-Sarko” to apologise to disappointed nurses and to receive honours that were to be conferred on her by a grateful nation.

“Cécilia skips Bulgaria”, said the headline in le Parisien-Aujourd’hui, a daily that casts itself as the voice of the people. “Mysterious, capricious, elusive, she has only once talked since her husband’s election,” it said. “Why is she not seen more at her husband’s side?” That critical tone was new for the normally respectful newspaper.

Mrs Sarkozy, a cross between Jackie Kennedy and Greta Garbo, has been seen rarely since a bad-tempered appearance on election night and a regal Prada-clad appearance with their children at his inauguration. She attended a spouses’ dinner at the G8 summit in Germany in June but left early. She has made no official appearance since Bastille Day on July 14. She was seen last week at the funeral of Jacques Martin, a television star and her first husband, whom she left for Mr Sarkozy.

The Sarkozys have not moved into the Élysée Palace as planned initially. They have retained their flat in Neuilly, the wealthy western district of Paris where Mr Sarkozy served as mayor. They spend weekends at La Lanterne, an attractive villa attached to the Château de Versailles that is traditionally used by the Prime Minister.

“The presidential staff look at the floor when anyone mentions Cécilia,” Libération, the left-wing daily, said yesterday. She made only rare appearances at the presidential seat, it said. Mrs Sarkozy spends time with friends, many from the fashion world, at the Bristol Hotel, one of the grandest in Paris and which is a few yards from the Élysée. Officials and friends deny that la première dame, who absconded for ten months with a public relations executive in 2005, had fled the conjugal nest again. Isabelle Balkany, a friend of the couple, said: “They have rows like any husband and wife but nothing more.”

Pascal Rostain, a celebrity photographer who took pictures of Mrs Sarkozy with her lover in 2005, said that Paris was thick with paparazzi on the hunt for another Cécilia scoop, but that “there is obvious nervousness among the bosses of the media when you mention the Sarkozys”. Some of the biggest media barons in France are friends of the President, and journalists are discouraged from displeasing him. The Editor of Paris Match lost his job for publishing the picture of Mrs Sarkozy and her lover.

In a book published this week, Mr Rostain and Bruno Mouron, his partner, describe how editors refused to publish pictures that they took of Mr Sarkozy in 2005 with Anne Fulda, a journalist with Le Figaro. Mr Sarkozy, then the Interior Minister and presidential candidate, had a relationship with Ms Fulda during his wife’s absence.

Last week a magazine was reported to have dropped a planned story on an apparent love letter that Mr Sarkozy was spotted carrying after a Cabinet meeting. When the story emerged, the Élysée laughed it off, saying that the President was simply carrying a letter that Mrs Balkany had written to Cécilia. Doubts remained because of a past participle which suggested that the addressee was a man.

Mr Sarkozy defended the absence of his wife in Sofia, saying that she had been wounded by the political row that followed her Libyan mission. “She has chosen to be as discreet as possible and that is a respectable choice,” Mr Sarkozy said. He praised the “courage, sincerity humanity and brio” that she had shown in Tripoli.

Last month, in her only public remarks since May, Mrs Sarkozy said that she was not playing the role of a “first lady” when she went to Libya but was acting out of her devotion to “helping and relieving misery in the world”. Her spokeswoman said that Mrs Sarkozy, who worked as a model and parliamentary staffer before her first marriage, spent a great deal of time replying to letters from people asking for help. Carina Alfonso Martin said: “She is someone who is very discreet. She does not publicise her actions and that bores the media.”

Critics, including disgruntled Sarkozy allies, regard the first lady as a liability. They say that she wants the privilege and power of the presidency without the duties. They blame her for decisions that have been politically damaging, such as Mr Sarkozy’s choice of a billionaire’s yacht for a holiday to celebrate his presidential victory. Her hand has also been seen in the promotion of her “favourites” to the Cabinet and staff jobs. These include Rachida Dati, 41, the glamorous Justice Minister, who Mrs Sarkozy describes as “a sister”. Mr Sarkozy is his wife’s biggest defender, often talking emotionally of his devotion to her. But on last Bastille Day, he let slip that “my only worry is Cécilia”.

How the other halves lived

— When Nelson Mandela went to prison, his first wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, embarked on a succession of affairs and was linked to politically motivated, including the killings of former lovers. She remained president of the ANC Women's League despite being implicated in at least 12 cases of assault, abduction or murder and facing charges of theft and fraud. Rather than pardon his wife, President Mandela divorced her shortly after being elected.

— Jane Hart, married to the US Senator Philip Hart and daughter of a multimillionaire former baseball team owner, had a different way of expressing her disproval of the Vietnam War than most political wives. The licensed helicopter pilot and former aspiring astronaut refused to pay her 1972 federal income tax to protest against war expenditures and travelled to Hanoi to speak with American POWs.

— Imelda Marcos didn’t just own 3,000 pairs of shoes; she also owned suitcases full of jewels and several bulletproof bras. The wife of Ferdinand Marcos, the late Filipino dictator, faced 901 charges of corruption for allegedly embezzling up to $30 billion with her husband. She has called Saddam Hussein “hospitable” and takes credit for ending the Cold War by allowing Mao Tse-tung to kiss her cheek. She recently launched an eponymous range of shoes and accessories.

Sources: Times archives; Time magazine

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