Jacques Foccart

Jacques Foccart (31 August 1913 – 19 March 1997) was a chief adviser for the government of France on African policy as well as the co-founder of the Gaullist Service d'Action Civique (SAC) in 1959 with Charles Pasqua, which specialized in covert operations in Africa.

From 1960 to 1974, he was the President of France's chief of staff for African and Madagascar matters for both Charles de Gaulle and Georges Pompidou. Foccart played such an important role in French policies in Africa that, after de Gaulle, he was seen as the most influential man of the Fifth Republic. But through SAC, he was considered to be involved in various coups d'état in Africa during the 1960s. Nevertheless, Foccart retained his functions during Georges Pompidou's presidency (1969–74)

In 1974 Valéry Giscard d'Estaing replaced Foccart with the young deputy whom he had himself trained. He was then rehabilitated in 1986 by the new Prime minister Jacques Chirac as an adviser on African affairs for the two years of "cohabitation" with socialist president François Mitterrand. When Chirac finally gained the presidency in 1995, the 81-year-old Foccart was brought back to the Elysée palace as an advisor. He died in 1997. According to The National Interest review, "Foccart was said to have been telephoning African personalities on the subject of Zaire right up to the week before his death."

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