Brian Mulroney (1939-2024) | “It marked our past, it still marks our present”

A “visionary” and “courageous” prime minister, but above all a “generous” and charismatic man. Both on the political scene and elsewhere, praise was poured out from everywhere upon the announcement of the death of Brian Mulroney, who died Thursday at the age of 84.

“It has marked our past, it still marks our present, and it will mark our future for a long time too,” responded the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau.

The latter said he learned with “great sadness” of the death of a man who “always sought to make this country a better place to live in”. To his statement on social media, the Liberal leader added, on the sidelines of a partisan event in Thunder Bay, Ontario, that Brian Mulroney had been “a true statesman.”

“I will never forget the advice he gave me over the years. He was generous, dedicated and very passionate about his work,” he continued, emphasizing the importance of “recognizing and celebrating the role that Mr. Mulroney played in the evolution of the modern, dynamic and prosperous country that we all know today.”

The Prime Minister of Quebec, François Legault, hailed “a visionary with his Canada-US free trade agreement”. “He stood up to oppose the apartheid regime in South Africa. He knew how to fight against acid rain, one of the great environmental challenges at the time. He was also a true ambassador who made Quebec and Canada shine,” recalled Mr. Legault.

“A mentor, a friend, a confidant”

Even though he saw Brian Mulroney in Florida just a few days ago, Jean Charest was still “in shock” on Thursday. “He told me he would like to see me, so I went to Florida. We saw each other Saturday evening. He was very weak. He had lost a lot of weight, he had difficulty walking, but he was alert,” said the man who was Minister of the Environment in the Mulroney government.

“He was for me a mentor, a friend, a confidant, a support in everything I did in my political life, and a quasi-father,” he confided in a telephone interview.

Brian Mulroney’s political legacy is immense, judges Jean Charest. “He had this ambition to change Canada for the better, and he had a lot of courage, because he had undertaken projects that were going to cost him popularity: free trade, the GST, constitutional negotiations, all of that was about controversial,” he stressed.

In the eyes of former Quebec Premier Lucien Bouchard, who was Minister of the Environment in Brian Mulroney’s Cabinet before founding the Bloc Québécois, the deceased “was a great friend of Quebec”. “He took great political risks to reconcile Quebec with the rest of Canada and showed a sensitivity towards Quebec that no other prime minister has ever had in Ottawa. He tried to create an asymmetrical place for Quebec in the federation,” he said in an interview Thursday evening.

Privileged links

It is the memory of a “generous” man that Paul Tellier, deputy minister and clerk of the Privy Council of Canada under Brian Mulroney, will keep. “He’s the best boss I’ve ever had,” he said.

The memory, too, of a statesman endowed with extraordinary interpersonal skills. American presidents Ronald Reagan and George HW Bush, British Prime Minister John Major – to name just a few – had close ties with Brian Mulroney, he recalls.

“He was able to build personal relationships, first and foremost, before talking about business. And it served Canada’s interests very well, both domestically and internationally,” he said.

“In my eyes, there is no prime minister in the history of Canada who has had as much influence on the international scene,” says former host and journalist Guy Gendron, author of the book Brian Mulroney: the man of great riskswhich stemmed from a documentary series.

According to him, Mr. Mulroney’s speech to the UN on apartheid left an impression around the world. “At the time, he had warmed the ears of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, who wanted nothing to do with his fight at first. The jaws of all African leaders dropped upon hearing it. No one had ever spoken like that to Margaret Thatcher,” notes Mr. Gendron.

He remembers that as soon as he was released from prison, Nelson Mandela even called Mr. Mulroney in person to tell him that his first speech in a democratic parliament, “he wanted to do it in Canada”.

A nationalist at heart

Author, columnist and journalist Gilbert Lavoie, who was also Brian Mulroney’s press secretary from 1989 to 1992, remembers a man “who had a great ability to build strong relationships with people.” “This man occupied a lot of space in the lives of everyone who worked for us. His death leaves a great void. It’s as if someone from the family was leaving,” breathes Mr. Lavoie.

According to him, Mr. Mulroney’s love for Quebec was beyond doubt. “Even though he was a federalist, he was a guy who felt more at ease in Quebec than anywhere else in Canada. »

Furthermore, the ease that the former prime minister had in maintaining relationships served him a lot in terms of diplomatic relations. “I had the privilege of being in the Bush house at one point. And we were there, like at the chalet, with his wife. It was very close relationships that Mr. Mulroney was able to develop with certain leaders,” says Mr. Lavoie.

At Laval University, where Brian Mulroney chaired three fundraising campaigns and where a pavilion dedicated to international studies will soon bear his name, the shock is just as strong.

“It shook us all. For us, Mr. Mulroney, he is a giant,” confides the rector of the university, Sophie D’Amours. “Mr. Mulroney was always a proud graduate and he had a lot of recognition. He said it was his golden years. With his class of 1963, they still got together,” adds M^me D’Amours, who hopes that future young students “will be challenged by the strong ambition that Brian Mulroney had.”

Mr. Mulroney will also have left his mark on the history of Quebecor, according to its president and CEO, Pierre Karl Péladeau. “From the end of the 1960s, he was a valuable advisor to my father, Pierre Péladeau, then he became an exceptional mentor for me. It was an honor to be able to count on his extraordinary experience,” the businessman said in a press release.

The House of Commons adjourned its proceedings earlier than planned after the announcement of Mr. Mulroney’s death Thursday evening, out of respect for the man who gave a good part of his life to public life.

With the collaboration of Mylène Crête and Yves Boisvert, The Press