Home > France > Nicolas Sarkozy Reveals Secret Health Crisis During 2007 Morocco Trip
Nicolas Sarkozy Reveals Secret Health Crisis During 2007 Morocco Trip
Friday 31 July 2020, by
During his single term, the former French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, suffered from a "serious" health problem that required an operation on October 21, 2007, just hours before his official visit to Morocco. More than a decade later, the successor of Jacques Chirac talks about this painful memory in a work "The Time of Storms".
In an interview given to Paris Match on Thursday, July 30, 2020, the former French head of state returned to the ailment he had long kept secret and which had not prevented him from carrying out his duties. For the former French president, a choice had to be made quickly as soon as he was diagnosed with a phlegmon (a throat abscess).
While he was supposed to make an official visit to Morocco the day after the diagnosis, the former President of the Republic, Nicolas Sarkozy, finally agreed to have the operation. According to him, there was no question of staying in bed in a hotel room during this official trip to the Kingdom. "I had to be operated on without general anesthesia... It was a few days after my divorce. Imagine the comments if I had canceled my trip," he clarified. And he added: "I therefore carried out this official visit to Morocco that I love so much while being physically very weakened."
During this "risky" official visit, several contracts were signed between the two countries, including civil and military contracts, estimated at nearly two billion euros. The other contract signed was for the construction of a high-speed train (TGV) line between Tangier and Casablanca at a total cost of 2 billion, of which one billion for civil engineering and one billion for the railway system, it is recalled.