The tribute paid this Friday, January 5 to the former President of the European Commission Jacques Delors will be chaired by Emmanuel Macron, who will salute the memory of a “ architect of united Europe » without which France would be « less master of her destiny “.
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There are currently around ten current leaders who have confirmed their presence at the tribute paid this Friday to Jacques Delors, died on December 27 at the age of 98. Among them, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo. The presidents of the European Council, Commission, Parliament and Central Bank are also expected, before a European tribute in Brussels later in January. The mayor of Lille Martine Aubry, daughter of Jacques Delors, was closely associated with the preparations, but will not speak, the Élysée announced.
France invited all the heads of state and government of the European Union, as well as the leaders of the community institutions, current or in office while the social democrat Jacques Delors sat in Brussels from 1985 to 1995. Among the guests , a name surprises: that of Viktor Orban. The Hungarian nationalist Prime Minister is the opposite of the legacy of Jacques Delors, recalls our Julien Chavanne, journalist in the international service of RFI. “ We invited everyone, without distinction », Evacuates an advisor to the French president.
Paris had no interest in blacklisting Viktor Orban: the voice of the Hungarian leader remains essential to validate – soon – a new tranche of aid of 50 billion euros to Ukraine. The leaders of the 27 have not seen each other since the last European Council in December: the summit had turned into a standoff with Hungary on the accession of Ukraine. Associating Viktor Orban with the tribute to Jacques Delors, his antithesis, is a way for Emmanuel Macron to reach out to the Hungarian leader.
European elections in sight
The national tribute in the courtyard of the Invalides in Paris will experience a “ innovation » linked to the continental dimension of the former President of the European Commission, who died on December 27 at the age of 98: after the funeral eulogy of the Head of State, the bell tolls and the Marseillaise, the Ode to joy, the European anthem, performed by the orchestra of the Republican Guard, the Élysée announced on Thursday.
According to his entourage, Emmanuel Macron will celebrate the role played by Jacques Delors in French politics, from his journey with the social Gaullist Jacques Chaban-Delmas in the late 1960s to his influence for France to remain in Europe in 1983 in as Minister of the Economy under socialist President François Mitterrand. The President of the Republic should say that “ France would not have remained a sovereign power in Europe as we know it today without Jacques Delors », Explained an advisor to journalists. In his wishes to the French on December 31, he invoked his “ legacy » to call for the “ decisive choice » of a “ Europe stronger, more sovereign “.
Read alsoFrance: death of Jacques Delors, the man who did not want to be president
Even if it is not a question of transforming this tribute into a campaign platform, the speech of Emmanuel Macron, who regularly poses as the leader of the pro-European “progressives”, should also resonate in the light of the elections European elections in June, while the far right is leading in the polls in France.
(And with AFP)