Jean-Claude Gaudin

Jean-Claude Gaudin (2011)

Jean-Claude Gaudin (born October 8, 1939 in Marseille , Mazargues district ) is a French politician ( UDF , UMP , LR ) and mayor of Marseille since 1995. Previously, he was also President of the Regional Council of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (1986–1998), Senator (1989–1995 and 1998–2017), Minister for Spatial Planning, Urban Development and Integration (1995–1997) and President of the Communauté urbaine Marseille Provence Métropole (2015-2018).

Life

The former history and geography teacher who taught for over 15 years participated in political life from a young age. In 1965 he became the youngest member of the Marseilles city council, and in 1971 he was re-elected. In 1973 he joined the Républicains indépendants (Independent Republicans), a liberal party, the following year he supported the election campaign of Valéry Giscard d'Estaings , the party leader at the time, who became president shortly thereafter.

In March 1978, as a candidate for the bourgeois-liberal Union pour la Démocratie Française (UDF) in the second constituency of Bouches-du-Rhône with 53.7% of the votes, he won an election against the previous socialist MP Charles Emile Loo, whom it gave him also succeeded in defending in June 1981. His fellow MPs then pushed him into the party chairmanship of the UDF. In March 1982 he won the cantonal elections in the twelfth canton at the first attempt with a record result of 72.82% of all votes cast. In the local elections in 1983 in Marseille, he headed the list of the opposition to the then Socialist Interior Minister Gaston Defferre , who was able to retain his long-term office as mayor despite a lead of 2,497 votes on the part of Gaudin. In 1986 he led the lists of the UDF in the Bouches-du-Rhône department in the national assembly and regional elections . In a general and direct election, he was elected the first President of the Conseil Régional ("Regional Council") Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur .

Two years later, after the National Assembly was dissolved, he was re-elected for the fourth time as a member of the Bouches-du-Rhône, still in the second constituency of Marseille, with over 60% of the votes cast. His party colleagues again expressed their confidence in him by re-electing him to the chairmanship of the UDF in the National Assembly.

March 1989 he ran for the second time for the office of Mayor of Marseille, but his attempt failed again. In September of the same year, he was a candidate for the Senate elections, as he expected that the Haute Assemblée , which was closer to the municipalities , would allow an addition to the scope for maneuver he had gained through his regional office, which his mandate had made more difficult to exercise. As soon as he was elected, he successfully helped his deputy, the medical professor Jean-François Mattéi, to replace him in his main constituency, Bouches-du-Rhône.

In 1992, the renewal of the Regional Council Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur forced an election in which Gaudin ran against the French actor and businessman Bernard Tapie and the far-right Jean-Marie Le Pen . Gaudin won the election.

With an absolute majority of 55 votes out of 101, Gaudin was elected Mayor of Marseille on June 25, 1995, and in September he was elected by the republican and independent senators to chair their parliamentary group in the Senate. On November 7th of that year he entered the second government of Prime Minister Alain Juppé as head of the Ministère de l'Aménagement du Territoire, de la Ville et de l'intégration , which he left after the dissolution of the National Assembly in June 1997 .

On October 6, 1998, he became Vice President of the Senate. On September 15, 2000 he was elected President of the new Communauté Urbaine of Marseille Provence Métropole . It was created on his initiative as the third Communauté Urbaine after Lyon and Lille and comprised 18 communities and 980,000 inhabitants.

In 2001, 2008 and 2014, Gaudin won re-election as mayor of Marseille. On November 17, 2002, he was elected Vice President of the conservative ruling party UMP , and on November 28, 2004, he was re-elected. From 2011 to 2014 he was chairman of the UMP parliamentary group in the Senate. He managed to make Marseille the European Capital of Culture in 2013 . An accumulation of offices as with Gaudin, combining a municipal with a national mandate, was common in France, but has not been permitted since 2017. Gaudin resigned from the Senate to remain mayor.