The one bright spot in a doomed campaign?

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON, MAY 23. If behind every successful man, there is a woman, the same can be said about some unsuccessful men - or men trying hard to be successful.

The Tory leader, Mr. William Hague, for instance. His wife Ffion, a glamorous business professional, is described in party circles as his ``secret weapon'' in an election campaign going nowhere. Unlike Ms. Cherie Blair, the Prime Minister's wife, who joins her husband's campaign only at the weekends, Ms. Ffion Hague has shelved a high-profile job in order to be with her husband right through the struggle even if it means just posing for the cameras, or flashing her Colgate smile at voters.

Three weeks into the campaign and she has spoken only once - when she famously said:``I certainly do'' at being asked if she thought her husband could win the elections for his party. The husband laid down the law, the very first day. ``I'll answer that,'' he told reporters sharply when they asked her if she was enjoying the campaign. She got the message, and mum's the word since then. The Tory spin is that they don't want the anti-Tory press to ``twist'' her words in order to embarrass her husband. They might have as well added that she is there to simply provide the glamour - to balance the non-presence of Mr. Hague.

The Tories' very own The Sunday Telegraph thought that she, rather than he, was the ``star'' of the campaign and wondered what it must be like listening ``attentively to the same campaign speech for the hundredth time...'' And, did it ``hurt'' being stuck with a man ``as much pilloried as William Hague''? Although the newspaper was confident that the lady wasn't going to do anything silly, there was a touch of anxiety in the way it speculated what she must be going through as she plays the mute fiddle day after day. ``When these four gruelling weeks of vote- garnering are over, will Ffion kick off her high heels....and say: Now William, why don't you dump this squabbling bunch of losers and ingrates, come into the city and make some proper money?''

The buzz is that quite often people have been turning up at Mr. Hague's meetings, not so much to hear him as to see and shake hands with the ``Mrs''. T.V. footage of people rushing to greet her even as the husband is struggling to catch their attention confirms who should have been calling the shots, but is under orders not to. Her popularity is said to be rising in direct proportion to the progressive decline in her husband's ratings.

The more Mr. Hague tries to reduce her to a prop, the more attention she attracts with even the Left-wing press not quite able to resist the discreet charm of a very bourgeois woman; and there has been much comment about the ``casual elegance'' with which she carries herself, even as a ``pretty puppet'', as a woman voter put it. A Tory fashion columnist contrasted her ``understated good taste'' with the ``horrors of the style guru makeover that Cherie Blair was forced to endure.'' There have been other comparisons with Ms. Blair - mostly unfair to the Prime Minister's wife. But for all her demure appearance, Ms. Hague, 33, is no pushover and those who have followed her career still remember the clout she wielded as a civil servant. In her current job - apparently as well paid as Ms. Blair's - she is known as a tough nut.

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