Tributes for ‘great European’ Giscard following death aged 94

3 December 2020, 12:44

Valery Giscard d’Estaing.
Valery Giscard d’Estaing. Picture: PA

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel was among those to honour the statesman.

Tributes have poured in for former French president Valery Giscard d’Estaing who has died aged 94.

Germany was quick to praise the convinced European who died after contracting coronavirus.

“France has lost a statesman, Germany a friend and all of us a great European,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in a tweet, via her spokesman.

President Emmanuel Macron praised Mr Giscard’s achievements at home and abroad of the man whose “seven-year term transformed France”.

“He allowed young people to vote from the age of 18, women to legally terminate unwanted pregnancies, divorce by mutual consent, got new rights for people with disabilities.”

US President Jimmy Carter, right, and the Queen are photographed with French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing in 1977 (AP)
US President Jimmy Carter, right, and the Queen are photographed with French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing in 1977 (AP)

But he also “worked for a stronger Europe, a more united Franco-German couple, and helped stabilise international political and economic life by founding the G7”.

France’s prime minister Jean Castex praised his leadership during the economic turbulence of the 1970s, during which he “significantly advanced the building of Europe and the international influence of France, whose history he marked”.

Known affectionately in France as simply by the initials VGE, his name sometimes too long to pronounce, Mr Giscard was president from 1974-1981.

He was the model of a modern French president, a conservative with liberal views on social issues.

He was full of contradictions.

Like an elected monarch with a technocrat’s skill and a feel for the zeitgeist, he played his accordion in working class neighbourhoods.

One Christmas morning, he invited four passing binmen to breakfast at the presidential palace.

He calmed a prison riot in Lyon by chatting with inmates in their cells.

President Valery Giscard d’Estaing with German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, in Tokyo in 1979 (AP)
President Valery Giscard d’Estaing with German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, in Tokyo in 1979 (AP)

But having long groomed himself for an office he won at 48, Mr Giscard then seemed to lose touch with common concerns.

When two newspapers reported he had accepted diamonds from self-proclaimed Central African Emperor Bokassa I, Mr Giscard airily refused comment and stopped reading them.

After French police arrested the man who had produced documents related to the scandal, the influential Le Monde commented: “France is no longer a democracy.”

Mr Giscard eventually countered the charges.

But by then a new election was approaching, and France wanted a change.

He lost to Francois Mitterrand in 1981, after just one term.

By Press Association

Latest World News

See more Latest World News

Israel Palestinians Britain Aid

UN top court orders Israel to open more land crossings into Gaza

Music-Green Day UN

Green Day to headline UN-backed global climate concert

Sam Bankman-Fried

FTX founder Bankman-Fried sentenced to 25 years in prison for crypto fraud

Israel Palestinians UN Security Council

Russia ‘abolishes’ monitoring of sanctions on North Korea with UN veto

France Valentino

Former Gucci designer Alessandro Michele named Valentino creative director

Russia Shooting

Russia arrests another suspect in concert hall attack that killed 143

American Easter egg

White House’s annual Easter egg roll to be attended by 40,000 people

Barbers in Paris

Proposal to ban discrimination over a person’s hair passes first legal hurdle

Mahmoud Abbas

Palestinian Authority names new government following pressure to reform

Arvind Kejriwal

Opposition leader Kejriwal locked up for further four days, court rules

Resident clears rubble from home

Russia wears down Ukrainian defences with missile and drone attacks

Pope Francis

Pope urges priests to avoid ‘clerical hypocrisy’ in Maundy Thursday speech

Wagner mercenaries

Wagner mercenaries helping to kill civilians in Mali, say human rights groups

Rescuers searching through rubble

Paramedics among 16 people killed by Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon

Hairdressers in Paris

French legislators ponder law to ban discrimination based on a person’s hair

Australian products in Shanghai

China ends tariffs on Australian wine as relations between countries thaw