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"I will not be able to answer": Alexandre Benalla, former collaborator of Emmanuel Macron, obstinately refused Monday to follow the main questions of the Senate on his passports, by retreating behind the judicial investigation in progress, causing the annoyance of parliamentarians.
Arrived at 14:00 under a cloud of photographers and cameras, dark suit and shaved fee, Alexandre Benalla first agreed to have made " a number of errors ", then said he had " not lied " when his first hearing before the same commission of inquiry, on September 19, when he stated that his passports were " at the Élysée ".
However, once this opening statement was completed, Alexandre Benalla refused to answer senators' questions: " judicial information in progress " and " right to non-incrimination ", the ex-chargé de mission pointed out.
Alexandre Benalla is indicted for violence on protesters in Paris on May 1 and, since Friday, for misuse of diplomatic passports after his dismissal. Annoyed, the chairman of the committee, Philippe Bas (LR): " You are obliged to answer! Impassive, Alexandre Benalla: " I will not be able to answer ".
Whether it is about diplomatic passports, " service passports ", his current activities or his travels in Africa after his dismissal, the former employee of the Elysee kicks in touch.
Philippe Bas, exasperated: " it is not being very respectful of institutions to refuse to answer (...), I am entitled to deduce from your answer that the question bothers you ". Benalla denies it: " No, these diplomatic passports were issued normally ".
Emmanuel Macron's chief of staff, Patrick Strzoda, heard Wednesday in the Senate, had charged Alexandre Benalla, as ministers Christophe Castaner (Interior) and Jean-Yves Le Drian (Foreign Affairs). Patrick Strzoda had revealed that Alexander Benalla had used " almost twenty times " his passports after his dismissal, between August 1 and December 31.
"Twenty- three times, " the young man grinned, " just to justify my identity, " including a dozen times in a private plane, he justified.
Alexandre Benalla assured to have returned the diplomatic passports " at the request of the presidency of the Republic and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (...) in the course of August 2018 ". He indicated that these passports had been " returned to him at the beginning of October 2018 (...) with a number of personal items a checkbook, a pair of keys, etc. ".
Since his first hearing in September, new questions had accumulated, as and when other revelations about the activities of the former close collaborator of Emmanuel Macron, especially in Africa where he met the Chadian President Idriss Deby. Here again, Alexandre Benalla replied at least: " I have informed people who work for the presidency of the Republic, " he argued before the senators, but refusing to give names or functions.
Similarly, while Patrick Strzoda said last week that Alexander Benalla had been in possession of two service passports, suspecting that one of them was obtained on June 28, 2018, through a " falsification ", the former security officer candidate Macron opposed the silence. " I do not hold any secrets. No secrets on anyone. I do not do any blackmail, "said Alexandre Benalla.
Parliamentarians must also hear at 16:30 Vincent Crase, a former employee of the presidential party LREM and squadron leader in the operational reserve of the gendarmerie.