The father of Argentina's President Mauricio Macri, the businessman Franco Macri, died Saturday evening aged 88 in his home in the Barrio Parque neighbourhood of Buenos Aires.
Macri senior had been suffering from several health problems. His cause of death was respiratory failure, the President's Office reported.
President Macri is in San Martín de los Andes, in southern Argentina, for a weekend holiday with his family. He has not yet released a statement on his father's death.
"I hope I have a quick death. I wouldn't want to be stuck in this life like my father who is here but not here. He's been bedridden for one year", President Macri said in a recent interview.
A CONTROVERSIAL FIGURE
Franco Macri was a controversial figure from whom, in recent decades, the president had tried to distance himself, at least publicly, as he attempted to build a clean reputation in business and politics.
Throughout his lifetime, Franco Macri was tied up in a number of corruption scandals, including most recently an alleged graft scheme between the construction sector and the previous Kirchner administrations and a shady deal for the purchase of six wind farms in Argentina's south. He was also widely criticised for his business dealings with the 1976-83 military dictatorship.
Franco Macri was born in Rome, Italy on Abril 15, 1930. He arrived in Buenos Aires with his two siblings at the aged of 19. His father Giorgi, separated from their mother, was already living in the country at the time of Franco's arrival.
In 1959, he launched his first business, which was dedicated to the construction of low-income housing projects. This would be the first of mor than hundred endeavours in the construction, car manufacturing, telecommunication and roadworks sectors.
-TIMES/PERFIL
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