François Baroin remembers a “tireless, passionate worker”

Jean-Pierre Elkabbach, 86, died Tuesday October 3. Léa Salamé and François Baroin were recruited by the famous interviewer. The councilor of Troyes remembers: “I was 21 years old. Elkabbach was a monument. He saw me at the start of the week and said to me: ‘I saw you. It’s good, you’re making sentences. We’re going to break all that, but I think you can be a journalist.’ (…) Six months later, he calls me back: ‘What’s your argument for saying no?’ That’s how I got a fixed-term contract at Europe 1.” The politician remembers a “tireless, passionate worker” with “an incredible light in the eye”.

“The energy of Elkabbach”

Jean-Pierre Elkabbach advised his colleagues to listen “their interlocutor”. Léa Salamé reveals: “During my first interviews, he called me and yelled at me, saying: ‘Short sentences! It’s not you we want to hear, it’s the political guest.'” The host of Quelle Époque! adds: “What I have left, beyond the charismatic boss, is energy. It was Elkabbach energy. He saw big. We were a small editorial team (…) and he made us believe that we were CNN.” Léa Salamé is moved by thinking about “a man with incredible demands” who was looking for “people who didn’t fit the mold”.