Would you trust this man?
Paris was swept by declarations, denials, rumours and crisis talks at the Elysée yesterday as President Jacques Chirac’s aides ruthlessly sought to quash the suggestion that he has taken to wearing a hearing aid. In a potentially career-ending gaffe, the environment minister, Roselyne Bachelot was asked in a radio interview on Wednesday about the rumour that M Chirac now wears the ear-piece. "Yes, I believe he does," she said.
At the cabinet meeting that morning, she was taken aside by M Chirac and given a stiff talking to. Afterwards, she rushed to her car, ignoring reporters’ questions. Later in the day, the government spokesman, Jean-François Cope, gave the official line. "Of course he doesn’t wear one," he said. "And even if he did, it wouldn’t be a big deal for a man of his age."
| Vanity, thy name is Jacques... |
M Cope’s clumsy denial, which was contradicted by various ministers speaking anonymously to newspapers, reflects the anxiety within M Chirac’s circle about his age. Next week he turns 71 and it is not something the Elysée is boasting about. M Chirac has every intention of dodging the law running for the presidency for a third time in 2007 and is doing all he can to maintain his image as a vibrant, in-touch leader.
| This is '03, and he's 71. In '07 he'll be... ummm... six years older. That'll make him 77. I plan to be well into my dotage at that age, sucking my gums and scaring little children on their way to school in the morning... |
He dyes his hair and several years ago gave up his spectacles for contact lenses.
| I have a strong suspicion Hosni dyes his, too, and he's at about the same stage of decrepitude at 75. Yasser's 74. Hmmm... Y'know, five years from now we might be rid of all three of them. |
During last year’s presidential campaign, he was incensed when his Socialist rival, Lionel Jospin, called him "old and washed-up". Left-wing student groups took up the theme by printing posters and placards showing M Chirac shaking hands with Leonid Brezhnev, a symbol of the old Soviet gerontocracy. The strange rumours persisted. In August, M Chirac failed to return to France as thousands died in the heat wave. He had chosen a remote town in Canada for his holiday and several newspapers reported that for a couple of days he disappeared from his hotel, perhaps for plastic surgery or an operation on his failing vocal chords. The Elysée denied this.
| Probably visiting childhood playmates at the old folks' home... |
The head of state’s rivals are doing everything possible to encourage the rumours. Libération yesterday quoted one anonymous minister as saying: "Of course he has a hearing aid. It’s very discreet, but I’ve seen it." Another told Le Parisien that M Chirac struggles to hear what his ministers are saying during cabinet meetings. Many were wondering about the coincidence of M Chirac’s main rival on the Right, the interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who is only 48, appearing in a magazine yesterday playing tennis and riding his bicycle.
On television and in press conferences, M Chirac has increasingly had to ask for questions to be repeated or given replies indicating that he has not heard the question. This may, however, be an old politicians’ trick. Keeping M Chirac from degenerating into an old geezer in the eyes of voters is the main preoccupation of his daughter and communications adviser, Claude Chirac.
| That'd be the daughter Sarkozy dumped? |
Besides recommending the hair dye and contact lenses, she also forced him to give up his 40-a-day cigarette habit and to give speeches using a tele-prompter, a trick she learned from another elderly leader, Ronald Reagan. Since Mme Bachelot’s gaffe, ministers have been bombarded with questions about the president’s hearing. The culture minister, Jean-Jacques Aillagon, said: "It’s none of my business and I would never allow myself to make such an offensive observation." This prompted condemnation from Entendre, a group for the hard of hearing. "Deafness is not ’offensive’," said its president, Pascal Bouroukoff. "It’s a problem to be corrected." He said he hoped M Chirac would be honest about his hearing and help to lift the "taboo".
They’re right, of course - there’s nothing shameful about deafness. It’s the lying about it that’s ridiculous.
| It's the pretending his lamb when he's actually mutton that's ridiculous. |
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