Jacques Auxiette, former PS president of the Pays de la Loire region and long mayor of La Roche-sur-Yon, died on Saturday at the age of 81, we learned from elected officials.
Born in Indre in 1940, Jacques Auxiette led a long professional career in teaching in Vendée.
At the same time, he joined the Socialist Party in the 1970s. In 1977, he became mayor of La Roche-sur-Yon, a position he held until 2004. He gave it up on that date to take up the post of president. from a region where he was elected councilor for the first time in 1979. Reelected at the head of the Regional Council in 2010, he had decided not to stand for re-election in 2015.
Many tributes
Tributes followed one another from his political friends as well as from his adversaries.
"
His commitment, his intelligence and his passion for Pays de la Loire made him an esteemed and respected President of the Region, well beyond his political camp
", wrote the current president of the region, Christelle Morancais (LR) in a communicated.
“
Despite our disagreements, I respected him.
We had the same conception of politics: he led an action in the service of his convictions,
”tweeted Senator LR, Vendéen like him, Bruno Retailleau who had succeeded him at the head of the regional council in 2015.
“
Sadness, at the memory of shared fights as well as of accepted differences.
Jacques Auxiette has worked a lot for the #paysdelaloire region
, ”tweeted MP François de Rugy, who sat on the Regional Council as EELV under the chairmanship of the deceased elected.
For her part, the mayor of Nantes, Johanna Rolland (PS) hailed "
the man of conviction (...) tireless fighter for secularism, equality and fraternity
".
As for his former friends from the Regional Council, gathered within the “
Printemps des Pays de la Loire
”, they “
salute the memory of Jacques Auxiette, express their deepest gratitude for his action, and will continue the fights for equality and territories he has always led
”.
Originally from the region, the secretary general of the CFDT, Laurent Berger greeted in a tweet "
a man anchored in his territory, listening to the forces and animated by a fierce desire to act on reality without denying anything of its values
”.
Pierre Moscovici, first president of the Court of Auditors, paid tribute to the "
man of republican and socialist convictions, passionately attached to his territory, elected effective and respected by all
".
The current mayor of La Roche-sur-Yon, Luc Bouard (LR), for his part evoked the memory "
of a mayor in the field, imbued with this particular listening which gives popular legitimacy
".
