On September 26, 2019, Jacques Chirac died at the age of 86, leaving behind him an immense political legacy but also secrets. There is one that is in a safe, if we are to believe the journalist Renaud Revel, author of the book The Paparazzi of the Republic. On the set of It’s up to you on February 21, 2022, he thus explained that there was a photograph of the former president which was kept in a safe place: the one where he appears naked!
Stars of political life, heads of state have to deal with discreet photographers who capture unexpected moments. For Jacques Chirac, this is a snapshot during a vacation at Fort Brégançon, the residence of the presidents of the French Republic. “Jacques Chirac was looking through the binoculars at Michael Schumacher’s yacht which was anchored nearby. He was actually naked.“, explained the writer in It’s up to you.
The photograph was taken by Stephane Ruet, at the time a young photographer from the French agency Sygma. “It was quite difficult to take her because the situation was weird. Even emotionally, it was weird. We were laughing among ourselves“, remembered the photographer for Le Figaro. Himself impressed to have been able to capture this particular moment of the most powerful man in the country, he wondered whether or not to publish this image of Bernadette Chirac’s husband in Adam’s outfit. Scheduled for Paris Matchthe photo will remain under seal: “We had decided not to publish it because the Élysée intervened.“
In Le Figarothe author of the shooting specified: “We did not see the journalistic interest in publishing such a photo. And that would have caused problems for the agency to continue to follow the president.“The president’s entourage had also alerted other French magazines to warn them, while worrying about seeing them appear in a British tabloid.
Anne-Elisabeth Lemoine, intrigued by this “state affair” similar to few others, wondered if the photo of Jacques Chirac in the simplest device could end up coming out. “This photo has been in a Paris Match safe for more than thirty years now (…) and it will never be published“, assured Renaud Revel.