Raymond Bourgine

Raymond Bourgine was born on March 9, 1925, in Diégo-Suarez, Madagascar. He grew up in the Réunion and Madagascar, and joined the French Army in Africa during the Second World War.

A proponent of French Algeria, Bourgine supported Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour in 1965. He supported Georges Pompidou for president in 1969. Close to Antoine Pinay, he joined the Centre national des indépendants et paysans (CNIP) in 1971. From 1977 to 1983, he served as member of the Council of Paris for the Rassemblement pour la République and advisor to the Mayor of Paris, Jacques Chirac. He was elected to the French Senate in 1977, and again in 1986 under the leadership of Maurice Couve de Murville. In 1987, he joined the senatorial organization for France-South African relations. He was also a fierce champion of capitalism and free enterprise and, like his avatar Alexis de Tocqueville, he supported the freedom of the press. He rejected the 1981 nationalisation legislations, and in 1985 he rejected government funding of the press. He sat on the Board of Trustees of the Centre Georges-Pompidou.