Funeral of Bernard Tapie in Marseille, a huge crowd to say goodbye to the « boss »

This Thursday, October 7, 2021, the Jean-Bouin stand was open and nearly 10,000 supporters returned in peace and silence, to the sound of Nothing by Kai Engel. The day after the VIP ceremony in the Saint-Germain-des-Prés church in Paris, it was the popular Marseille, the one Bernard Tapie knew how to put in his pocket, which found itself gathered at the Stade Vélodrome.

From the middle of the afternoon, on the edge of the steps leading to the stadium, facing Boulevard Michelet, a huge black and white portrait of the former president of Olympique de Marseille (1986-1994) had drawn, with a caption: « Rest in peace the boss, you will be forever in our hearts ».

At 3.30 p.m., an hour and a half before the scheduled opening of the stadium itself, a blue and white tide was already stretching out in a long queue to go and sign the guest books made available by the club in a salon.

Carried by supporters, the coffin entered the pitch shortly after 6 p.m., when, on the giant screen replaying the legendary match against AC Milan on 26 May 1993, Basile Boli scored the decisive goal. Jump, by Van Halen, who always punctuates the entrance of the players, instantly makes it feel like a great match.

Shortly after 6:45 p.m., the funeral convoy resumed its journey to heavy applause. A small group of supporters stayed for a long time to greet the presidential platform, where the family of Tapie were located, the players of the squad who did not leave for the selection, Pablo Longoria, Jorge Sampaoli and elected officials of the City.

The crowd was gathered to greet the coffin of the businessman, who in the morning crossed the Old Port to reach the Cathedral of Sainte Marie-Majeure.

A group of anonymous people who walk in silence, where those who simply want to accompany the one « who brought them so much happiness » congregate. The family clan, who let this incredible moment unfold, is waiting a few hundred meters away, near the cathedral which overlooks the sea. The OM ultras, a few thousand supporters gathered since the morning, follow at a respectful distance. Smoke lit, flags flying, the groups, which emerged from the tarpaulin behind which they were crossing Europe in the early 1990s, sing the glory of « their » former president.

This is where the mass, celebrated by the Archbishop of Marseille, started at 11 a.m. Bernard Tapie’s coffin made its debut on his daughter, Sophie Tapie’s song, « Phoenix », performed by a choir. Her grandson then played « Amazing Grace » on the trumpet.

« Today, you enter the Pantheon of the heart of the Marseillais » said Renaud Muselier, the president of the Paca region, at the start of the ceremony.

« The gladiator is finally resting, » said Bernard Tapie’s friend, former minister Jean-Louis Borloo.

« You were not the mayor of Marseille, you were Marseille, » he said, before Senator Samia Ghali and the mayor of Marseille Benoît Payan took the floor.

« Bernard Tapie was not a saint, far from it! », Conceded Mgr Jean-Marc Aveline, in his homily, recalling that the former businessman had « touched both the peaks and the abysses, the power lounges as prison cells « .
But « he loved this city because it resembled him, popular and free, proud and rebellious, tender and violent at the same time. »

The Marseillais also greeted the family of the one they venerated as the “boss”: his wife Dominique, his four children, his grandchildren… But also all the local politicians, from the socialist mayor of Marseille, Benoît Payan, to the LR president of the department and the Metropolis, Martine Vassal, through Renaud Muselier, the LR president of the region, or Samia Ghali, deputy mayor of Marseille.

Bernard Tapie’s coffin left the cathedral of the major to the sound of « We are the champions » by the group Queen. He was buried in the cemetery of Mazargues, in the south of the city, in family privacy.

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Gabriel MIHAI

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