IN MEMORIAM

The 9^th October our colleague José Lidón Meseguer, also known as Pepe Lidón among his many friends, died. I met Pepe when he was working as a Manager of Means of Payment of the CAM. I collaborated with him in different projects, first from Computing services and later from Auditing Computer services. We always had a good relationship of friendship, comradeship and professional collaboration.

When I took the retirement, my friend Pepe Lidón telephoned me; he invited me to have lunch because he wanted to talk. I told him that he didn’t have to invite for lunch, it would be enough to tell me where did he usually had coffee –he was an addict– so, we met in a cafeteria in La Rambla to talk. We talked about our Association JubiCAM, the Spanish Federation and the European Group, which he presided in that moment. We went to the office where he did his business (an office inside JubiCAM) and he explained me all the things he did. He asked me to collaborate with him and, he seemed to be so snowed under with all the work that I could not say no. In this way I started a collaboration with the European Group that lasts already more than 10 years.

I want to make clear that the Group has been consolidated and has reached the current number of associated members and sympathizers thanks to our second President Pepe Lidón. He was the soul and promoter of the Euromeetings and, without this event, I do not believe that we would have reached the present situation. He has always had a good relationship with colleagues from Portugal, England, Germany, Belgium, Italy and Sweden; his humanity, spirit of service, disposition to dialogue and negotiation, and, above all, his generosity, were the qualities to make a lot of friends in the group of retired of the European savings banks. The first Euromeeting took place in ISDABE in May of 1996; in May of 1998 and during another Euromeeting held in the same place, he assumed the presidency of the Group until April 2002, during the Euromeeting of Peñíscola, when I had the honour to substitute him, being named in that moment Honorary President of our Group.

I want to give to his whole family our most heartfelt condolences. I want to tell them that our Honorary President will always be present in our memories and hearts.

José Roberto López Martínez
President of the European Gruop