Paris (AFP)

The National Gathering denounced Sunday a political maneuver of power after the release in the JDD of a police report summarizing the investigation which led to Marine Le Pen being indicted since 2018 for suspicion of fictitious jobs of assistants of RN MEPs.

"The JDD, official organ of Macronist power, emerges the same endless affair of parliamentary assistants, as in each election," reacted on Twitter Marine Le Pen, angry to see this case resurface one month from the regional elections scheduled for the 20 and June 27.

"Nothing new under the sun, except maybe good polls in sight?", She again quipped.

The treasurer of the RN, Wallerand de Saint-Just, directly accused on BFMTV the Keeper of the Seals Eric Dupond-Moretti of being at the origin of the "leak" of the report, "a despicable tissue of inaccuracies and slander" , denouncing a "violation of the secrecy of the instruction".

"The RN in the European Parliament is a bit like take the sorrel and shoot yourself," replied Secretary of State Clément Beaune on Europe 1 / Cnews / Les Echos, while many political leaders from all sides have denounced "the fraud" and "the swindle" of the National Rally.

According to the Sunday Journal, this is a 98-page report from the anti-corruption office (OCLCIFF) dated February 15 and addressed to the examining magistrate Claire Thépaut, who led the investigations.

The magistrate was however appointed in December to the court of Bobigny and is no longer in charge of the case.

The report summarizes, "possibly for the benefit of the new magistrate in charge of the case" comments one of the actors in the case, the elements gathered by the investigation opened in March 2015 and entrusted at the end of 2016 to investigating judges of the pole financier of the Paris court.

About 25 elected officials and assistants of the RN, including the president Marine Le Pen, her father Jean-Marie and senior leaders, are indicted for "embezzlement of public funds" or concealment of this offense.

The magistrates suspect the RN of having "in a concerted and deliberate manner" set up a "system of diversion" of the envelopes allocated by the EU to each deputy to pay parliamentary collaborators (21,000 euros per month).

These collaborators would have worked in reality for the frontist party, thus allowing it substantial savings on its wages.

- "Cynicism" -

The European Parliament, civil party, reassessed in 2018 its damage to 6.8 million euros in this case, which then led to separate investigations in Paris on the MEPs assistants of the MoDem and La France Insoumise.

The National Rally, which disputes any misappropriation, is also indicted in this procedure, also opened for "organized swindle" and "covert work".

"Obviously Marine Le Pen and the National Front have a problem with public money", criticized the boss of LREM deputies Christophe Castaner on LCI / RTL / Le Figaro ".

The ex-LR Valérie Pécresse denounced on radio J "totally unacceptable practices" which say, according to her, "a lot about the cynicism and the methods of the RN".

"When the party which presents itself as that of the fight against fraud turns out to be one of the best experts! .. What if we did without the RN in the second round of the presidential election?" the national secretary of the PS Olivier Faure on Twitter, while the number one of the Greens, Julien Bayou, blasted "an organized gang scam".

According to several sources familiar with the matter, the investigations could not be closed in 2020 as planned, the Covid-19 crisis having notably delayed the lifting of the immunity of MEP Jean-François Jalkh by the European Parliament.

This, requested by the French investigating judges for his indictment, the last expected in the case, was finally lifted on March 23.

In recent years, the defense has multiplied the appeals, so far rejected, without hiding its objective of "postponing the holding of a possible trial to post-presidential 2022", according to one of the lawyers.

© 2021 AFP