Elisabeth Kopp, who in 1984 overcame accusations involving her husband to change into the primary girl elected to Switzerland’s governing Federal Council — however who couldn’t overcome one other scandal a number of years later, additionally associated to her husband, and resigned when she had appeared more likely to be the nation’s first feminine president — died on April 7 in Zumikon, southeast of Zurich. She was 86.
Her demise was introduced on April 14 by the federal chancellery, The Related Press reported. The trigger was not specified.
Mrs. Kopp had been mayor of Zumikon for a decade and had served two phrases in Parliament when a retirement opened up a seat on the seven-member Federal Council, which runs the primary authorities departments and whose members take turns serving a one-year time period because the nation’s president.
Mrs. Kopp was one of many extra left-leaning members of the conservative Radical Democratic Social gathering, recognized for her work on environmental points in addition to for advancing girls’s causes, and polls confirmed her to be well-liked. However the effort to raise her to the council prompted her political enemies to fire up dust on her husband, Hans Kopp, a lawyer.
The assaults riled Mrs. Kopp’s supporters.
“Swiss feminists and liberal politicians have reacted with indignation to press stories that the husband of Switzerland’s first girl candidate for the nation’s highest political workplace was suspended from authorized follow for six months in 1972 after fees that he spanked secretaries in his agency,” The Guardian reported in 1984.
“In 1971,” the newspaper continued, “a lawyer in Mr. Kopp’s agency mentioned that Mr. Kopp had punished misdemeanors within the workplace by wielding a bamboo cane on naked bottoms.”
His proper to follow legislation was suspended for six months by a Zurich attorneys watchdog fee. However the mudslinging backfired: In early October 1984, Mrs. Kopp gained election to the council anyway, with Parliament voting 124 to 95 to pick out her over a male candidate, Bruno Hunziker. Commentators on the time mentioned that the makes an attempt to undermine Mrs. Kopp’s candidacy in all probability solely strengthened it.
Her election was an necessary second within the push for ladies’s equality in Switzerland, a rustic that had lagged behind most of Europe in that space; girls didn’t achieve the proper to vote in federal elections there till 1971.
Mrs. Kopp was the primary girl to serve within the seven-member cupboard. She instructed The A.P. on the time that her election was an indication that “equality of the sexes is taken severely now.”
However, she mentioned, being a girl within the largely male universe of politics — solely a couple of tenth of the members of Parliament have been girls on the time — meant additional challenges.
“In politics, girls should do higher than males in the event that they wish to succeed,” she mentioned.
Every council member heads a federal division, and through her tenure Mrs. Kopp’s titles included justice minister and inside minister. In 1988, it was her flip to rotate into the vice presidency, and he or she was duly elected by Parliament late that 12 months. However she by no means took the publish, due to one other scandal associated to her husband.
Studies got here to gentle that Mrs. Kopp, who was minister of justice on the time, had not too long ago tipped off her husband that an organization he was concerned with was the main target of a money-laundering investigation and urged him to chop his ties, which he did. She at first denied any impropriety — “I wouldn’t like one to assume that I may have dedicated or tolerated wrongdoing,” she mentioned on the time — however she resigned from the council due to what she known as “insufferable strain.”
She finally acknowledged offering data to her husband, and in 1989 she was indicted on fees of violating official secrecy legal guidelines. Throughout her trial in February 1990, admirers applauded her as she left the courthouse every day. A Supreme Courtroom jury acquitted her. Had she not resigned, she would have change into president that very same 12 months.
Elisabeth Ikle was born on Dec. 16, 1936, in Zurich to Max and Beatrix Ikle. Her father was a director common of the Swiss Nationwide Financial institution, and her mom helped set up a nursery faculty.
Mrs. Kopp was a talented determine skater in her youth. She studied legislation at Zurich College and graduated with honors. She met Mr. Kopp whereas doing volunteer work on behalf of Hungarians who fled to Switzerland in 1956 after the Soviet Union crushed a preferred rebellion in Hungary.
As inside minister, Mrs. Kopp was typically the federal government’s public voice on immigration — a contentious challenge in Switzerland, particularly as folks from international locations like Sri Lanka sought to come back there. She was seen by some as taking an anti-immigrant stance, though she mentioned her concern was about “false” asylum seekers — folks in search of to maneuver for financial causes relatively than due to political persecution.
“This results in a rise in xenophobia,” she mentioned in 1987, “which makes it tougher for us to satisfy our human obligations.”
After her political profession, Mrs. Kopp did postgraduate research in European legislation and human rights legislation and labored at her husband’s legislation agency. Mr. Kopp died in 2009. Details about Mrs. Kopp’s survivors was not instantly out there.
The primary girl to function Switzerland’s president, Ruth Dreifuss, was elected in December 1998.
