"We note that the indictment of the UDF and the Modem intervene in the middle of the electoral campaign" for the presidential election, reacted to AFP the lawyer for both parties, Me Francis Teitgen.

The UDF, swallowed up by the MoDem when it was created in 2007, has retained a legal existence.

Fifteen people, including François Bayrou, former Minister of Justice Michel Mercier and former MEPs Sylvie Goulard, Nathalie Griesbeck and Jean-Luc Bennahmias, have already been prosecuted in this judicial investigation conducted since 2017 by investigating judges from the financial center of the Paris judicial court.

The survey concerns the organization of the work of people hired with European funds as parliamentary assistants for MEPs, but who could have held a job, full or part-time, at the UDF then at the MoDem.

These indictments suggest a closure of the investigations in the coming months.

"The MoDem, the UDF like François Bayrou affirm both with force and peace of mind that we have the evidence showing that there is no offense," said Me Teitgen.

The investigations established "that there are no fictitious jobs for parliamentary assistants" for MEPs and "moreover, that there is no personal enrichment for parliamentarians either," added Me Teitgen.

The Paris prosecutor's office opened an investigation in March 2017 after the denunciation of a former elected member of the National Front, Sophie Montel, on the fictitious jobs of employees of 19 of her colleagues from all sides, including two from the Modem: Robert Rochefort and Marielle de Sarnez - who died in January 2021 - right-hand man of party president François Bayrou.

Three months later, a former collaborator of the MoDem, Matthieu Lamarre had claimed to have been partially paid in 2011 as an assistant to the former MEP Jean-Luc Bennahmias while he was working for the centrist party in Paris.

Already in 2014, in a book, the former MEP Corinne Lepage, breaking with the MoDem, had written to have refused this practice.

These revelations weakened the MoDem, President Emmanuel Macron's main ally, and led to the resignation of François Bayrou, then Keeper of the Seals, Marielle de Sarnez (European Affairs) and Sylvie Goulard (Armies), a month after their entry into government.

The Modem has always assured to have "respected all the rules".

"Low cost operation"

The survey focuses on the 2009-2014 European legislature but also, to a lesser extent, on the previous and subsequent legislatures.

In 2019, a dozen centrist MEPs, officials or former party officials were indicted, in particular for "embezzlement of public funds".

François Bayrou was indicted in December 2019 for "complicity in the embezzlement of public funds" between June 2005 and January 2017.

In a letter addressed to activists immediately after, he assured that his party "had never used the European institutions for its advantage" and had "never used fictitious jobs".

In front of the anti-corruption police officers, the mayor of Pau had evoked a context of political revenge, stressing that the accusations emanated from people in conflict with the Modem.

According to a report made in April 2021 by the Anti-Corruption Office (Oclciff), in charge of investigations, the centrist party has set up an "old and more or less informal system" of embezzling European funds to pay its employees.

"To support his party and ensure its functioning at a lower cost, François Bayrou and Marielle de Sarnez, supported by party officials, have placed at the service of the UDF, then of the Modem, parliamentary assistants paid by the European Parliament" , is it summarized there.

The loss of the European Parliament is assessed at 1.4 million euros, but including the full (400,000 euros) of the remuneration of assistants who still partially worked for MEPs, underlines the author of the report.

Insubordinate France (LFI) and the National Front (FN) are also targeted by investigations into irregularities in the employment of parliamentary assistants.

© 2022 AFP