The team at Agence Europe and, more widely, scores of journalists, commentators, friends, fellow travellers and staunch Europeans are saddened at the loss of Michel Theys, who died last Tuesday.
It is the story of a little boy from Brussels. He was born in Etterbeek on 9 July 1951, the oldest of three children. His parents ran a perfumery in the town centre. After he left school, he read, discovered, wended his way, started frequenting the theatre, made friends with the stars who played within Les Galeries' group and the entourage of the choreographer Maurice Béjart. Why didn’t he take to the stage himself? His unique experience was more that of an extra (a naked one, if you will excuse the imagery). The stage made him want to write. He approached a major Belgian weekly at the time, Pourquoi Pas ?, and offered to report on Avignon Festival. They agreed to give him a trial… They published every article he submitted. The editorial secretary at the daily newspaper La Libre Belgique, Jacques Franck, another avid theatre-goer, read this unknown writer’s prose, set up a meeting and gave him a job on the spot, to do a little bit of everything. A bit of gumption, an opportunity seized.
The young Michel had another great passion: football. Because he played the game, he could speak the language; he made a bit extra on the side by reporting on matches at the weekend. One fateful day, he met Anne, a hostess at Anderlecht Stadium. It was love at first sight – and again, Michel didn’t hang about! They married in December 1974. The fact that Mrs Theys stayed loyal to Anderlecht while Mr Theys was a Standard Liège fan never came between this devoted couple. Respect!
Posted to the international desk at La Libre, he learned as he went along, found his feet, discovered European issues. Another passion was ignited. In 1978, he became the paper’s European correspondent; at the time, I was covering the same issues for RTBF’s daily news programme and the now defunct daily, La Cité. Our paths crossed for the first time, as they would do again and again. The midday meetings in the Berlaymont press room, led by the incredible Manuel Santarelli, hours of waiting around in the Charlemagne whilst ministers negotiated until dawn, the first meetings of the European Council: there was an unforgettable sense of camaraderie in our little accredited journalists’ club.
Michel joined Agence Europe as deputy editor in 1989, under Emanuele Gazzo until 1994, and then Ferdinando Riccardi. This accolade was soon followed by another, in 1991: the European Press Prize, awarded by the Association of European Journalists (AEJ). Meanwhile, our man had set up his own company, EuroMedia Services, an international network of specialist journalists, producing publications in various formats. This was when he first became involved in our Bibliothèque européenne section; later, he would take charge of it, remaining so until his illness forced him to step away. Our readers have had the benefit of countless reviews of books on Europe, quality reviews that myriad observers and researchers found invaluable. Michel was also the editor-in-chief of the monthly EURINFO (1990-2008) and L’Europe en mouvement (1994-1995) and served as the President of the International Press Club Brussels (1995-2000).
At the turn of the century, Michel stepped down from his position as deputy editor. He was already co-producer and presenter of the European affairs programme on the Télé-Bruxelles channel (now BX1), an experience that would last seven years (1999-2006); he added the role of Brussels coordinator of a new magazine, La Quinzaine Européenne, an initiative of the group ‘Dernières Nouvelles d’Alsace’. The aim was to give French-language readers the kind of solid information about what was going on in the EU that was already available in English. The adventure would last for three years (2001-2003). Nothing daunted, Michel set up and ran L’Européenne de Bruxelles (2004-2005) in an unsuccessful bid to pass on the flame. His efforts did not go unrewarded: they won him the Prix Richelieu for the defence of the French language in 2005.
As if this were not enough, our journalist, who was known for the educational quality of his articles, shared his expertise with students at the IHECS School of Journalism (2003-2005) and the UCL’s School of Communication (2001-2015).
As a long-serving President of the Belgian section of the AEJ (1998-2010), Michel had not only an outstanding network of colleagues, but an unparalleled understanding of the needs of journalists covering European news and how the profession was evolving. The biggest risk is the divide between pro-European but inaccessible media on the one side, and powerful, comprehensible media spouting rampant populism on the other.
In 2016, Michel returned to our Agence, this time as lead columnist, to take over from Ferdinando Riccardi, who very sadly died the next year; Michel devoted a moving tribute to him (see EUROPE 11869). He also found time to write and publish a remarkable biography of a remarkable man: ‘Jacques-René Rabier. Fonctionnaire-militant au service d’une… certaine idée de l’Europe’ (Peter Lang, 2017) (see EUROPE 11755).
At around this time, this European from Brussels found a second homeland. Greece worked its charms and its magic on him: he took a profound interest in the financial and social crisis that ravaged the country and the EU’s conduct towards it. Many of his articles would now be sent in from the island of Tinos, where he spent several months every year. No doubt his Greek neighbours are currently sharing in our sadness.
For 40 years, Michel Theys had a front-row seat for the evolution of Europe. He knew his way around the texts, but often found its institutional system frustrating. He felt that it was unbalanced, to the point of being sabotaged, by the modus operandi of a European Council that was incapable of delivering on its mandate of setting out the broad orientations of the EU and busied itself instead with the improvisation made necessary by the lack of foresight, and with managing national self-interests amplified at the highest level. Unaccountable to the Parliament and therefore incapable of meeting the European citizens’ aspirations, which were growing higher and more urgent, or those of the leaders, as various Eurobarometer surveys made clear. Because like Rabier, Theys believed that European public opinion exists, as it is measurable. He also believed that the juxtaposition of national elections – like the ones we will be having this month – falls a long way short of the voters’ appetite for a European agora. To change the system, he would have gone for a Convention of citizens from the new generation whose names had been drawn at random to write a new foundation text for the EU of the 21st century. This approach couldn’t do any worse than the system of intergovernmental conferences, which he felt had proven itself not to work.
His final editorial was published on 4 July 2018 (see EUROPE 12054). At the time, Mr Salvini and the Visegrad gang were setting the pace. The disastrous results of the European Council, which reckoned it could resolve the ‘migration crisis’ by purely national means loaded with xenophobia, made him feel pessimistic about the future, not only the future of the EU, but also of our democracies. He concluded by saying: “it is now for the European democrats, from the whole of Europe, to put up some kind of resistance to these excesses that are jeopardising not just the European Union, but, ultimately, long-term peace on our continent as well. They need to remember that, as Henri Lastenouse wrote, ‘the European project responds both historically and ontologically to the experience of the fascist regimes in Europe in the 20th century’. They need to put up some peaceful resistance, remembering those who took up arms in the Resistance of the 1940s, hoping to build a European federation at the service of its citizens on the smouldering ruins left behind by the Second World War. Which is not what the European Council has ever had in mind”.
Michel, as it turned out, was sounding the alert: the future will decide whether his concerns were justified. The common theme in his own destiny was clear: precise, comprehensible information at the service of the citizens. By all possible means. He was a colleague of great charm and a most loyal friend. A fighter, he only ever stopped work for others. The devil was in his pen sometimes, but there was always an angel in his smile. He rebelled against the world, but had only joy in its people. It was as if he always wanted to be pleasantly surprised by some facet of everybody’s personality. His laugh was hearty because his soul was pure. He was a beautiful person fighting for a great cause. Above all else, and let us never forget it, he was the European citizen’s best friend.
Renaud Denuit