QUEBEC - Claude Bechard, a youthful Quebec cabinet minister who soldiered on in his post despite suffering from terminal cancer, died on Tuesday at the age of 41.
His life was marked by a passion for politics and Bechard seemed to find solace in the affairs of state even as he confronted a slew of personal tragedies.
In his final months, ailing, thin and visibly weakened by his pancreatic cancer, he continued working and made a dramatic return to the legislature following one lengthy absence.
"You have to live," a frail Bechard told reporters minutes before stepping into the legislature on his first day back in June.
"You have to live. We're not here to sit around and wait for things to go wrong. We're here to live. You have to live life to the fullest."
In August, he had the job of minister of Canadian intergovernmental affairs added to his duties as agriculture minister.
Just hours before the death was announced, Premier Jean Charest fought back tears at a news conference where he paid tribute to his colleague and expressed his hope for a medical miracle.
"Claude Bechard was elected in 1997, a very young MNA in the national assembly, has had an extraordinary career and is young and energetic and very determined and loved politics very deeply and I think politics loved him."
The premier said Bechard became a very good friend, beginning when Charest arrived as party leader in 1998.
"He was young, he had an extraordinary sense of humour and he had a very lively mind and was extremely bright, very versatile.
"He was the kind of minister in a government who was able to accomplish several types of responsibilities. He could be a troubleshooter when needed -- someone who could go in and fix things and get them back on track."
Prime Minister Stephen Harper said in a statement that Bechard was an inspiration who "devoted himself to his constituents."
"Struck by illness, he never gave up and was an example of courage and determination for people who fight cancer."
Bechard was a combative man -- once referring to himself as "insolent" -- a character trait he used as much against his disease as his political opponents.
Nothing in his early life suggested he would go on to a stellar political career. Bechard was born into a farming family on June 29, 1969, in Quebec's Lower St. Lawrence region, the youngest of eight children.
He was the only one in his family to attend university, completing a degree in political science and a master's in land planning and regional development at Universite Laval in Quebec City.
Energetic and ambitious, he dreamed of a career in politics.
As a young man, Bechard supported the Quebec Liberal party and, at 24, he was hired as a political aide to then-premier Robert Bourassa, who was nearing the end of his final term.
Soon after, the Liberals found themselves back on the opposition benches.
Around the same time, Bechard's brother, to whom he was extremely close, committed suicide. It would haunt Bechard for the rest of his life.
In 1997, he decided to run as the Liberal candidate in the Kamouraska-Temiscouata riding -- near his own rural birthplace -- in a provincial byelection.
He won and, at age 28, Bechard became an elected member of the national assembly.
He went on to be re-elected in 1998, 2003, 2007 and 2008. In a decade, he clearly won the hearts -- and the votes -- of his constituents. He defeated his closest opponent by a slim 110 votes in 1998 but that margin had grown into a 6,612-vote landslide in 2008.
Charest was impressed by the young legislature member and when the Liberals regained power in 2003, the premier named Bechard to a number of key portfolios.
Between 2003 and 2010, Bechard served as family minister, economic development minister, environment minister, minister of natural resources, agriculture minister and minister of intergovernmental affairs.
The sharp-tongued Bechard was also Charest's first pick when the premier needed a point man to take on opponents.
A talented political tactician to boot, he was in the premier's close inner circle and helped manage his communications strategy.
During question period in the legislature, Bechard was a formidable opponent who took pleasure in political jousting.
But his easy charm outside the chamber earned him more friends than foes.
Before he fell ill, some saw him as the heir-apparent to Charest's throne.
Then in the spring of 2008, he began to suffer stomach pains and was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, a particularly aggressive form of the disease.
That June, he underwent surgery to remove a tumour on his pancreas and an obstructive lesion in his small intestine.
Bechard still chose to campaign when Charest called an election in the fall of 2008, despite ongoing chemotherapy treatments that left him exhausted.
It was a visibly ailing man who presented himself to constituents that year.
Along with cancer, he was struggling with the death of political aide Nancy Michaud, who had been brutally murdered a few months earlier.
In January 2010 his cancer returned and he was rushed into surgery to remove tumours on his intestines. He would spend almost half of his two-year battle with cancer on sick leave.
But he was eager to return to work.
His suits hung loosely on his thin frame when he returned to the legislature but he carried himself with the air of a man who found joy in his work.
He leaves behind two daughters from a previous relationship, his spouse Mylene Champoux, and her two children.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper said in a statement that Bechard "devoted himself to his constituents."
"Struck by illness, he never gave up and was an example of courage and determination for people who fight cancer."
