PARIS (AFP) – France on Thursday bid farewell to former prime minister Lionel Jospin, with President Emmanuel Macron leading a national tribute to the influential leftwing statesman credited with major welfare reforms.
Jospin, who introduced the 35-hour work week when he was head of government from 1997 to 2002, died on Sunday aged 88.
The ceremony took place at the historic Les Invalides national monument, the resting place of Napoleon Bonaparte, in the presence of Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu, top left-wing politicians, and other high-profile guests.
Jospin’s widow, the philosopher Sylviane Agacinsky, 80, was in attendance.
Members of the Republican Guard carried the casket draped in a French flag into the courtyard to the beat of a drum before Macron read a eulogy, saying Jospin fought for justice and freedom.
“He helped bring France into the new century,” Macron said.
“Lionel Jospin modernized the nation’s economic, social and democratic life in an unprecedented manner.”
Afterwards the Republican Guard Band performed a post?war French classic, “Les Feuilles Mortes” (“The Dead Leaves“), which Jospin himself had sung on television in 1984.
Jospin was to be buried at the Montparnasse cemetery in the south of Paris. Several thousand people were expected to attend the funeral, which is open to the public.
