Chirac and Sarkozy

French President Jacques Chirac ends his final full day in office Tuesday with an evening farewell speech to the nation that he has led for 12 years.

The debonair¹ 74-year-old turns over power Wednesday to tough-talking fellow conservative Nicolas Sarkozy, who won election on pledges of a break with the past.

Stepping down from the presidency², Chirac will be closing out some four decades in politics. Chirac founded the neo-Gaullist Rally for the Republic party, today transformed into the Union for a Popular Movement, or UMP, that Sarkozy headed before being elected president on May 6.

He still risks paying a price for his ambitious search for funds for his party. Without presidential immunity³, Chirac could be subject to corruption⁴ investigations⁵ into alleged⁶ illegal party financing.

Chirac said his goodbye to Europe on Sunday in Berlin, insisting on the need for a strong role for Europe in a "multipolar" world -- an issue that was a mainstay of foreign policy under Chirac but which so far remains⁷ unfulfilled.

The concept of a "multipolar" world to counter the United States is dear to Chirac, and he made it come alive with the French-led opposition⁸ to the invasion of Iraq.

Chirac has no intention of retiring to his rural Correze region in central France. He plans to create a foundation devoted⁹ to sustainable development and dialogue between cultures, to be launched this fall.

The only other president to issue a televised farewell to the nation was Valery Giscard d'Estaing, on May 19, 1981, before turning over power to Socialist¹⁰ President Francois Mitterrand. With a much remembered final "au revoir," Giscard stood, made an exit and left an empty chair in the spotlight¹¹.