On October 16, French voters chose Francois Hollande to be the Socialist Party’s presidential candidate. This is the first time any French political party has used a primary to choose its presidential nominee. Voters who said they sympathized with the left, and who paid one Euro, were free to vote in the primary. The first round had been on October 9, when six candidates ran. Because no one got as much as 50%, a run-off was held a week later. See this story, which says that 2,800,000 voters participated. It is not clear if this is the number who voted in the first round, or the second round.