Black notebook: Raymond Guyaz, former radical trustee of Yverdon, has died

“He defended the North of Vaud and he was a historic radical,” State Councilor Pascal Broulis said of him. Raymond Guyaz died Tuesday at the age of 81, his family announced. He was notably trustee of Yverdon, deputy and president of the Grand Council.

Born in 1943, Raymond Guyaz became involved in teaching after studying literature. “He was my French teacher at college,” remembers the former radical unionist of Yverdon Rémy Jaquier. I learned grammar from him. He was a demanding and fair teacher.”

The Yverdon Gymnasium opened in 1974. It was the first outside of Lausanne. Raymond Guyaz was then appointed professor there. He was dean and taught Latin to generations of students. He left teaching during his syndication, carried out at a rate of 100% from 1990 to 1993. He then decided to return to the gymnasium, after a professional leave that his civil servant status then permitted. “He participated in the consolidation of this gymnasium,” notes Pascal Broulis.

Raymond Guyaz climbs the ranks of the Radical Party. “He was an excellent orator, a man of letters,” remembers Rémy Jaquier. In a city where the left and the right often alternate, Raymond Guyaz took over the union from 1990 to 1993, after a socialist.

Another socialist, Olivier Kernen, succeeded him. “When he was a member of the Municipal Council, he intervened in a harsh, precise and intellectual manner,” reports the latter. Then I was a member of the Municipality of which he was trustee. It was a pleasant time, because he managed the sessions by seeking consensus, even if it took a little longer. Under his union, the City was going through a difficult period financially and we carried out the projects launched previously: the large hall of Marive, the Collège de la Villette and the fire station.

For Pascal Broulis, “Raymond Guyaz was deadpan, amusing and jovial. He was trustee at a time when Yverdon was beginning to become aware of its role as the canton's second town, where it was moving away from the image of fog and a working-class city to become more urban and take its destiny in hand.”

Raymond Guyaz was a deputy in the 1990s and 2000s. He chaired the Grand Council in 1998, in an “efficient and orderly” manner, reports Olivier Kernen, also a deputy at the time and who describes him as a “discreet deputy, while being effective in committee.

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Jerome Cachin has been a journalist in the Vaud section since 2019, specializing in politics. He was responsible for the Vaud page of Freedom from 2003 to 2019. He is the author ofVaud political institutions, avec Mix & Remix.More info

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