Sarkozy Takes First Step Towards Elysee Return Nicolas Sarkozy has won back the leadership of France's conservative UMP party - a step towards becoming France's president for a second time. After losing the presidency to Socialist Francois Hollande in 2012, Mr Sarkozy made a comeback in September and won the UMP election on Saturday with 64.5% of the vote. The result left him just short of the 70% analysts said he needed to see off rivals and become the party's undisputed presidential champion. He scored 85% when he last won the leadership, in 2004. Mr Sarkozy with his wife Carla Bruni during a 2010 visit to London Alain Juppe, a UMP heavyweight who has said he wants to be its presidential candidate in 2017, was not ready to stand aside for Mr Sarkozy after the vote. "I am ready to help him of course if we take the course I have set out, rallying the right and the centre," he told reporters after the result. We will see for the (presidential) primaries. That's not the subject. The opposite of vigilance is what? It's going to sleep? I am not going to go to sleep. Francois Fillon, Sarkozy's other main potential rival for the UMP presidential ticket, took a similar line. Marine Le Pen's Front National has stolen votes from the UMP "Unity does not mean submission," he said in a statement. For my part I will defend my convictions. Sarkozy said the campaign had been "dignified" and took comfort in what he said was a record turnout, calling it in comments on his Facebook page "the best response to two years of internal quarrels and divisions." The 24-hour online vote was delayed on Friday by a cyber attack on the election website, but in the end more than 58% of UMP members had cast a vote, a bigger turnout than in past elections, and party officials declared it fully valid. With Mr Hollande's ratings plunging to record lows after tax rises and a failure to tackle unemployment, the opposition conservatives should be flying high. But the UMP has been split by leadership squabbles, and both it and Mr Sarkozy are mired in a legal inquiry into alleged funding irregularities. Although Mr Sarkozy says he is the innocent victim of a politically motivated plot, concerns about the cases have weighed on his poll ratings. His 2014 platform has been aimed at winning voters back from Marine Le Pen's far-right Front National and refounding the 12-year-old UMP. He has sought to appeal to voters worried about multi-culturalism, and urged the European Union to hand back all but its core powers to national governments. He also recently vowed to revoke a 2013 law allowing same-sex marriage.