BRUSSELS: Albert II, the modest, self-effacing King of the Belgians, remained true to his title Saturday, calling on his divided people to stick together under his son, Prince Philippe.
The king, 79, who formally abdicates Sunday, said earlier this month he was stepping down because poor health and age meant he could no longer meet the demands of his post.
His 20-year reign increasingly focused on maintaining the unity of a nation torn between its French- and Flemish-speaking halves, calling for no little political skill.
Born June 6, 1934, Albert was the second son of Leopold III and Queen Astrid but succeeded to the throne on August 9, 1993 after the unexpected death of his brother, King Baudouin, who had no children.
The country had largely expected that Albert, then already nearly 60 and having spent 30 years as a "super-ambassador" promoting Belgium's foreign trade, would step aside and let Philippe take the crown.
Albert was known to be a bon vivant, a lover of fast cars, and had married in 1958 a noted beauty of the day, Italian aristocrat Donna Paola Ruffo di Calabria.
He "did not have the devotion of his brother", royal biographer Patrick Reogiers said of Albert II.
However, he surprised his doubters "as the sense of duty quickly came to the fore", said Christian Laporte, another writer on the Belgian monarchy.
Albert showed that he understood better than many how his subjects really felt, especially in 1996 when the notorious Dutroux paedophile murder case traumatised the nation.
After a protest march in Brussels by thousands who felt the authorities had let them down, Albert met the survivors of the Dutroux nightmare, a gesture "which without a doubt" helped steady the country as a whole, Laporte wrote.
Albert was also seen as the king of a "new Belgium" after constitutional reforms in 1993 set up a federal structure giving extensive powers to Flanders, the Flemish-speaking north of the country, to French-language Wallonia in the south, and to Brussels, the capital hosting European Union and NATO institutions.
As tensions rose between the French- and Flemish-speaking communities, Albert II was a constant reminder the monarchy was one of the few institutions that all could support.
But in the past few years even that has come under pressure as nationalist Flemish politicians attacked the role of the crown, and then the king personally.
He worked tirelessly to bring both sides together, calling in political leaders of all persuasions as one political crisis followed another to the point where the country was without a government for 18 months after elections in 2010.
National polls due next year are shaping up to be even more divisive, presenting a daunting challenge for his successor.
Albert was forthright in denouncing what he saw as the separatist tendencies at work in the country -- a message he made again Saturday when he called on the country to maintain its cohesion in the face of many challenges.
The king's personal life was marked by early tragedy -- his mother Astrid died in a car accident in Switzerland when he was only one.
Albert II had three children -- Prince Philippe, born in 1960, and Astrid and Laurent. In 1999, the king publicly acknowledged another child, Delphine Boel, born to Baroness Sybille de Selys Longchamps with whom he had a long affair dating back to the 1960s.
She went to court in June to win official recognition, the latest chapter in a string of scandals that hit the royal family this year and that led to a government decision to demand the family for the first time pay taxes on its state allowances.
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