Édouard Balladur

Édouard Balladur
Balladur in 1993
Prime Minister of France
In office 29 March 1993 – 17 May 1995
President	François Mitterrand
Preceded by	Pierre Bérégovoy
Succeeded by	Alain Juppé
Minister of Finance
In office 20 March 1986 – 12 May 1988
Prime Minister	Jacques Chirac
Preceded by	Pierre Bérégovoy
Succeeded by	Pierre Bérégovoy
General Secretary of the President
In office 5 April 1973 – 2 April 1974
President	Georges Pompidou
Preceded by	Michel Jobert
Succeeded by	Bernard Beck
Assistant General Secretary of the President
In office 20 June 1969 – 5 April 1973
President	Georges Pompidou
Preceded by	Paul Auriol
Succeeded by	Jean-René Bernard
Personal details
Born	Édouard Léon Raoul Balladur (1929-05-02)2 May 1929 İzmir,Turkey
Political party	LR(2015–present)
Other political affiliations	UNR(1964–1967) UDR(1967–1976) RPR(1976–2002) UMP(2002–2015)
Spouse	Marie-Jo sắc phe Delacour ​ ​ (m.1957)​
Children	4
Education	Aix-Marseille University Institut d'études politiques de Paris École nationale d'administration

Édouard Balladur(French:[edwaʁbaladyʁ];born 2 May 1929)is a French politician who served asPrime Minister of FranceunderFrançois Mitterrandfrom 29 March 1993 to 17 May 1995. He unsuccessfully ran for president in the1995 French presidential election,coming in third place.

Biography

Balladur was born inİzmir,Turkey,to an ethnicArmenianfamily with five children and longstanding ties to France. His family emigrated toMarseillein the mid-to-late 1930s.

In 1957, Balladur married Marie-Jo sắc phe Delacour, with whom he had four sons.

Early political career

Balladur started his political career in 1964 as an advisor to Prime MinisterGeorges Pompidou.After Pompidou's election asPresident of Francein 1969, Balladur was appointed under-secretary general of the presidency then secretary general from 1973 to Pompidou's death in 1974.

Balladur returned to politics in the 1980s as a supporter ofJacques Chirac.A member of the Neo-GaullistRally for the Republic(RPR) party, he was the theoretician behind the "cohabitation government"from 1986 to 1988, explaining that if the right won the legislative election, it could govern with Chirac as prime minister withoutSocialist PartyPresidentFrançois Mitterrand's resignation. AsMinister of Economy and Finance,he implemented aliberal economicpolicy reminiscent of the one attributed toRonald ReaganandMargaret Thatcher.He thus implemented a majorprivatisationprogramme, involving several companies nationalised in 1945 and 1982, such as theCompagnie Financière de Suez,Paribasand theSociété Générale.He also privatisedTF1.He also reduced the number of civil servants and state expenditure.

Balladur appeared as an unofficial deputy Prime Minister in the cabinet led by Chirac. He took a major part in the adoption of liberal and pro-European policies by Chirac and the RPR. After Chirac's defeat at the1988 presidential election,part of the RPR held him responsible of the abandonment ofGaullist doctrine,but he kept the confidence of Chirac.

Prime Minister

When the RPR/UDFcoalition won the1993 legislative election,Chirac declined to become Prime Minister again in a second "cohabitation" with President Mitterrand, and Balladur became Prime Minister. He was faced with a difficult economic situation, but he did not want to make the political errors of the previous cohabitation government. He continued the economic policy he had undertaken in 1986 by carrying out new privatisations (notablyRhône-Poulenc,Banque Nationale de ParisandElf).Conveying the image of a quiet conservative, he did not question the wealth tax (reestablished by the Socialists in 1988).

He disagreed with François Mitterrand by considering thatnuclear testswere necessary to maintain the credibility of the French deterrent.

Despite corruption affairs affecting some of his ministers, who he forced to resign (thus lending his name to the so-called "Balladur jurisprudence"), he had the support of influential media.

1995 presidential election

When he became Prime Minister, Balladur had promised Chirac that he would not enter the1995 presidential election,and that he would support Chirac's candidacy. However, a number of right-wing politicians advised Balladur to run for the presidency in 1995. He went back on his promise to Chirac and entered the campaign. When he announced his candidacy, four months before the election, he was considered the favourite. In the polls, he led Chirac by almost 20 points. However, from the position of an outsider, Chirac criticized Balladur as representing "dominant ideas", and the gap in the polls decreased quickly. The revelation of a bugging scandal which implicated Balladur also contributed to a drop in his popularity among voters.

In the first round of the election, Balladur finished in third place with 18.6% of the vote behind the Socialist candidateLionel Jospinand Chirac. He was thus eliminated from the final run-off election between the top two candidates, which Chirac won.

Chirac immediately appointedAlain Juppéto replace Balladur as Prime Minister. Despite Chirac declaring that he and Balladur had been "friends for 30 years", Balladur's decision to stand against him greatly strained their relationship. As a result, the "Balladuriens" who had supported him in the presidential election, such asNicolas Sarkozy,were ostracized from the new Chirac administration.

Later political career

Balladur failed to win the elections for the presidency of theÎle-de-Franceregion in 1998, the RPR nomination for the mayoralty of Paris in 2001, and the Chair of theNational Assemblyin 2002. He presided over the National Assembly's foreign affairs committee during his last parliamentary term (2002–2007). Since the 1980s, he had advocated the unification of the right-wing groupings into a single large party, but it was Chirac who managed the feat, with the creation of theUnion for a Popular Movementin 2002.

Following the2007 French presidential election,Nicolas Sarkozynominated Balladur to the head of a committee for institutional reforms. Theconstitutional revisionwas approved by the Parliament in July 2008.

From 1968 to 1980, Balladur was president of the French company of theMont Blanc Tunnelwhile occupying various other positions in ministerial staff. Following the 1999 deadly accident in the tunnel, he gave evidence to the court judging the case in 2005 about the security measures he had or had not taken. Balladur claimed that he always took security seriously, but that it was difficult to agree on anything with the Italian company operating the Italian part of the tunnel. From 1977 to 1986, he was president ofGénérale de Service Informatique(later merged intoIBM Global Services), making him one of the few French politicians with business experience.

In 2006, he announced that he would not run again for re-election in 2007 as a member of Parliament for the 15tharrondissementof Paris, a conservative stronghold.

In 2008, Balladur visited the United States to speak at an event organized by the Streit Council, aWashington-basedthink tank.Balladur presented his latest book, in which he outlined a concept for a "Union of the West".

Balladur is often caricatured as aloof, aristocratic, and arrogant in media, such as theCanard Enchaînéweekly or theLes Guignols de l'infoTV show. Incidentally, the percentage ofFrench governmentministers who were also members ofLe Sièclepeaked at 72% under Balladur'sPrime Ministership(1993–95).

Political offices held

• Governmental functions
  • Prime minister: 1993–1995.
  • Minister of State, Minister of Economy and Finances: 1986–1988.
• Electoral mandates
• National Assembly of France
  • Member of theNational Assembly of Francefor Paris: Elected in March 1986, but he became minister / 1988–1993 (Became Prime minister in 1993) / 1995–2007. Elected in 1986, reelected in 1988, 1993, 1995, 1997, 2002.
• Regional Council
  • Regional councillor ofIle-de-France:March–April 1998 (Resignation).
• Municipal Council
  • Councillor of Paris: 1989–2008. Reelected in 1995, 2001.

"Karachi affair"

Investigativeforensic accountingenabled by theleakedPanama Papersrevealed aspects of theKarachi affair,also dubbed "Karachigate", with the Ministry of Justice examining whether armament contract commissions paid bySaudi Arabia,thenPakistan,financed the 1995 presidential campaigns of Balladur or Chirac, whose administration then succeeded in taking office.In May 2017, Balladur and his former Defence MinisterFrançois Léotardwere each charged, in relation to the Pakistan deal, with "complicity in misuse of corporate assets and concealment".In June 2019, Balladur's former campaign manager, Nicolas Bazire, was one of six men convicted over the arms deal, and was sentenced to three years imprisonment for using "illegal funds" in Balladur's 1995 campaign.On 4 March 2021, Édouard Balladur was acquitted by theCourt of Justice of the Republic,a special court that tries members of the government for actions performed in the exercise of their functions.

Cabinet

(29 March 1993–17 May 1995)

• Édouard Balladur– Prime Minister
• Alain Juppé– Minister of Foreign Affairs
• François Léotard– Minister of Defense
• Charles Pasqua– Minister of the Interior and Regional Planning
• Edmond Alphandéry– Minister of Economy
• Nicolas Sarkozy– Minister of the Budget and Spokesman for the Government
• Gérard Longuet– Minister of Industry, Foreign Trade, Posts, and Telecommunications
• Michel Giraud– Minister of Labour, Employment, and Vocational Training
• Pierre Méhaignerie– Minister of Justice
• François Bayrou– Minister of National Education
• Philippe Mestre– Minister of Veterans and War Victims
• Jacques Toubon– Minister of Culture and Francophonie
• Jean Puech– Minister of Agriculture and Fish
• Michèle Alliot-Marie– Minister of Youth and Sports
• Dominique Perben– Minister of Overseas Departments and Territories
• Bernard Bosson– Minister of Transport, Tourism, and Equipment
• Simone Veil– Minister of Social Affairs, Health, and City
• Michel Roussin– Minister of Cooperation
• Hervé de Charette– Minister of Housing
• Alain Carignon– Minister of Communication
• André Rossinot– Minister of Civil Service
• Alain Madelin– Minister of Companies and Economic Development
• François Fillon– Minister of Higher Education and Research

Changes

• 19 July 1994 – Minister of CommunicationAlain Carignonleaves the Cabinet and the Ministry is abolished.
• 17 October 1994 –José Rossisucceeds Longuet as Minister of Industry, Foreign Trade, Posts, and Telecommunications.
• 12 November 1994 –Bernard Debrésucceeds Roussin as Minister of Cooperation

Filmography

• 2011:Mort d'un présidentde Pierre Aknine: played by Cyrille Eldin

Bibliography

• For a Union of the West,2009, Hoover Institution Press,ISBN978-0-8179-4932-7.

External links

Media related toÉdouard Balladurat Wikimedia Commons