Bygmalion trial: Jean-François Copé returns the ball to his former collaborators
The former boss of the UMP Jean-François Copé upon his arrival in court.
Paris, June 9, 2021. AFP - BERTRAND GUAY
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
Simple witness, but eagerly awaited.
At the trial on the excessive spending of the presidential campaign of Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012, Jean-François Cope repeated this Wednesday in court that he had been strictly kept out of the Bygmalion scandal.
Publicity
Read more
Charcoal suit, light shirt, it is a confident, almost relaxed, Jean-François Cope who appears in court.
From the outset, the former boss of the UMP lays the foundations for his line of defense.
“
I have always had a very collective conception of management,
” he says with mischief.
Then he continues: "
There is a very strict separation between the function of secretary general and that of treasurer
".
Unlike ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy tried for "illegal campaign financing" and 13 other defendants - former executives of the UMP and Bygmalion in particular - Jean-François Cope was dismissed in this case.
The former boss of the UMP has always claimed to have learned only in May 2014, and in the press, of the establishment of a system of false invoices to make the UMP pay bills for the campaign of candidate Sarkozy, in order to avoid the explosion of the authorized expenditure ceiling.
Facing the court, he does not vary one iota in his explanations.
If he is there, he says, it is only to restore the truth, reports our special envoy,
Pierre Olivier
.
That of a man from whom it was concealed that the party he led was funding up to 20 million and illegally the campaign of its president candidate Nicolas Sarkozy.
No reason to be suspicious
At the turn of a sentence, Jean-François Cope scratched him, telling how all the light should shine on him during meetings.
Meetings, in fact, there is a lot of discussion during this hearing.
How could the secretary general of candidate Sarkozy's party ignore the surge in spending and the abysmal deficit of the UMP?
Jean-François Copé assures him: if he signed the loan orders, he had no reason to be wary of his collaborators.
He initialed, he explains, where he was told to sign, without going back to all the files.
According to him, the fault lies with the party treasurer, accountants or auditors.
The former boss of the UMP even places himself in "Father the rigor" and launches to the court: "
If I had been informed for a single moment of these transactions, I would have immediately said that I did not accept it. not.
"But to the question"
who was the originator of these false invoices?
", Jean-François Cope kicks in touch:"
I would be unable to answer you
.
Newsletter
Receive all international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
Justice
France
Nicolas sarkozy