Mr. Mulroney followed a path to leadership in the early 1980s that was as improbable as it was meteoric — leaping from relative political obscurity to assume leadership of Canada's Conservatives at a moment of internal chaos in the party.
He actually made himself rich as a corporate lawyer and showed some innate political skills. He could rally a crowd, wear down opponents in marathon negotiations, and was not afraid to take bold economic steps, such as selling off state-owned enterprises and concluding a North American Free Trade Agreement with the United States and Mexico.
Tall, square-jawed, and radiant with a smile, he even looked the part of a studio leader in an era defined by Reagan, a bona fide former movie star.
Mr. Mulroney has known the highs and dark lows. In 1984, he led one of the biggest political collapses in Canadian history, but fell to almost unparalleled levels of unpopularity less than a decade later.
He was often criticized for changing his views and policies to suit the moment and for having an unbridled ego. Political observers speculated that Mr. Mulroney, who came from humble roots in Quebec, saw himself as an outsider who constantly needed to prove his mettle.
Allegations of abuse of power surfaced after his political career ended. A government investigation in 2010 found that Mr. Mulroney accepted envelopes full of cash totaling at least $225,000 after leaving the prime minister's office. The payments were allegedly part of the efforts of an aviation lobbyist, Karlheinz Schreiber, to win Canadian contracts for his clients, including Airbus.
The committee's report described Mr Mulroney's apparent actions as “inappropriate”, but did not lead to new legal action. Mr. Mulroney has previously denied any wrongdoing and, in 1997, was awarded $2.1 million from the government in a defamation case arising from investigations into the allegations.
Ultimately, Mr. Mulroney leaves a complex legacy.
“Mulroney has many images,” Jonathan Malloy, the political scientist, wrote in 2008. “Among them is a tough ideologue, a very entertaining person, obsessed with opinion polls, deeply indifferent to public opinion, a consummate worker whose prowess is constantly being exposed, a statesman and perhaps a hustler.”
But his impact on Canada cannot be denied. His government signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1992 and accelerated the sell-off of state-owned enterprises, including famous holding companies such as Air Canada in the late 1980s and energy giant Petro-Canada in 1991.
One of his government's most stunning — and most controversial — moves came in 1991 when it imposed a nationwide goods and services tax of 7 per cent, which raised prices across Canada but helped stabilize the nation's finances.
On social issues, Mr. Mulroney has also emerged as a leader. It stimulated greater recognition of indigenous rights and led Canada to become one of the first Western countries to ratify an international biodiversity convention and climate change agreement, both of which were signed in 1992.
Deputy Prime Minister Don Mazankowski once described Mulroney's major accomplishment as dragging Canada into the 21st century.
Martin Brian Mulroney was born in Baie-Comeau, Quebec, a paper mill town on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River, on March 20, 1939. His parents had roots in Ireland but raised their children as loyal Quebecers, with Mr. Martin Mulroney as his father. Mulroney and his brothers slide seamlessly between English and French.
Mr. Mulroney attended a Catholic boarding school in New Brunswick, and graduated in 1959 from St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia. While studying political science, he took on local organizing roles for Conservatives. He earned a law degree in 1964 from Laval University in Quebec City and joined a powerful Montreal law firm now known as Norton Rose Fulbright.
He kept his hand in politics as a Organizer and advisor to the Quebec branch of the Progressive Conservative Party, which was forced from power by Pierre Trudeau's resurgent Liberal Party.
Mr. Mulroney built national political connections as a member of a commission created in 1974 to investigate union practices at the James Bay hydroelectric project. The commission's startling findings – including allegations of underworld infiltration of unions – gave Mr Mulroney his first taste of the national political spotlight.
In 1976, the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party, Robert Stanfield, resigned after a series of electoral losses. Mr Mulroney lacked practical political experience, but made a bid for the party leadership position.
He waged a free-spending campaign—“an exciting, astonishing campaign,” he later said—that included his private jet and earned him the nickname “The Cadillac Candidate.”
After finishing third, he spiraled into chaos even while holding down a job as an executive at Iron Ore of Canada. He battled alcohol abuse and pronounced bouts of depression, according to several biographies.
A pivotal moment for Mr. Mulroney came during a business trip to Romania in 1980. He had several glasses of Remy Martin lined up in front of him at closing time in the lobby of the InterContinental Hotel in Bucharest, and he exploded with anger at his worried-looking friends. About drinking it.
The next morning, according to the 2005 biography “The Mulroney Secret Tapes” by Canadian author Peter C. Newman, Mr. Mulroney announced: “Guys, I've just made a decision. I'm going on the bandwagon. I'm going to play tennis this summer and get what I want.” [stuff] Together with my head in shape.”
Mr. Mulroney kept his word. He later credited his recovery and return to politics to his wife, Mila Pevnicki, the daughter of a Serbian doctor who immigrated to Canada. She threatened to leave him and take the children if he did not stop his notorious drinking and drinking, Canadian political journalist John Sawatsky wrote in his book Mulroney: The Politics of Ambition (1991).
He and his wife had four children, Ben, Caroline, Mark and Nicholas. His daughter entered provincial politics in Ontario. His son Ben is a well-known Canadian television personality. A complete list of survivors was not immediately available.
In 1983, Mr. Mulroney won a seat in Parliament for Nova Scotia and assumed leadership of the Progressive Conservative Party. By the following year, Trudeau's government was collapsing, and opinion polls indicated rising Conservative opposition. Mr Mulroney and the Conservatives seized the opportunity, nearly doubling their seats In the 282-seat Parliament in one of the largest political battles in Canadian history.
Mr. Mulroney soon faced his first crisis: the 1985 bombing of an Air India Boeing 747 on the Toronto to New Delhi route. The attack over the Atlantic Ocean claimed the lives of 329 people, including 268 Canadians. Years later, Canadian officials apologized for shortcomings in the investigation and may have ignored India's warnings about an imminent attack by Sikh militants.
At the same time, Mulroney fostered ties with Reagan, bonding over their shared Irish backgrounds, Cold War politics, and belief in deregulation. At what was called the “Shamrock Summit” in Quebec City in 1985, the two leaders, dressed in tuxedos, sang “When Irish Eyes Smile.”
However, Mr. Mulroney also offered a public rebuke of American foreign policy during his two terms in office, which included his re-election in 1988. He told C-SPAN in 1993 that he believed Washington too often ignored Canada, its largest trading partner, while it lavished attention On the “tin”. “Dictators” in Central America during the 1980s. Opening Canada to refugees fleeing the oppression of US-backed regimes in El Salvador and Guatemala.
By the early 1990s, Mr. Mulroney's political fortunes were in free fall. The GST has given opponents a major weapon. In one 1992 poll, Mr. Mulroney's approval rating was 11 percent. He retired from politics in 1993 and was replaced by then Defense Minister Kim Campbell as Prime Minister.
The 1993 election was a disaster for the Conservatives. The party moved from 156 seats in Parliament to two seats.
“Popularity is bad for you,” Mr. Mulroney once said in a 1992 campaign speech, according to the Toronto-based National Post. “I try to avoid it like the plague, and I've been reasonably successful.”
