Stéphane Tapie regretted on the set of BFMTV that his father Bernard did not, before dying, do what was necessary to “protect” Dominique Tapie. The son of the businessman describes it today as “more than ruined”.
“I blame him for not having sheltered her”. Stéphane, the eldest son of businessman Bernard Tapie, regrets that his father did not do what was necessary to financially “protect” Dominique Tapie, his companion for more than 40 years, before his death. He confided in BFMTV on the occasion of the publication of his book how to say goodbye to youin which he talks about his relationship with his father.
“I think he felt so invulnerable, ‘unkillable’…And I think he ended up believing his cancer was going to beat him too. So that’s towards the end where he started to trying to get organized, to protect her, but it was a bit late”, explains Stéphane Tapie.
Dominique Tapie is today “more than ruined”, according to her son-in-law because she was “in solidarity with the debts” of her husband. She is living today “what he has been living for years”.
The businessman’s wife had been ordered jointly and severally to reimburse 403 million euros in the arbitration of the Crédit Lyonnais affair. Also added to this sum were 200 million euros in penalties for non-reimbursement. Dominique Tapie thus had to sell all of his assets (real estate, shares in the newspaper Provencebags and luxury scarves) and lives today with 800€ per month in a two-room apartment rented in the chic 7th arrondissement of Paris and whose rent is paid by one of his friends, the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo .
“It’s the least he owed her”
“I think he left with this real regret of not having sheltered her because it was the least he owed her,” laments Stéphane Tapie.
“That’s the only thing where I have real bitterness towards him is not having protected her because she was really the woman who made [qu’il] became Bernard Tapie”, he explains again. She was “his crutch, his guide, his rest, his energy… She is the woman I wish for everyone and the mother I wish for everyone to have”.
Very close to his mother-in-law for whom he says he has “immeasurable admiration”, the former radio host and columnist is all the more surprised by his father’s attitude because “his children came after him, his wife not “. However, he specifies that Dominique Tapie “is in good health”. She “is doing the best she can,” says Stéphane Tapie.
