Move along, nothing to see.
Information on the indictment of the Secretary General of the Élysée, Alexis Kohler, and the referral to the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR) of the Minister of Justice, Éric Dupond-Moretti, both announced on Monday October 3, have not provoked a reaction from the President of the Republic, for whom the resignation of one or the other does not seem so far, as the Keeper of the Seals said on Tuesday morning, "to order of the day".
Alexis Kohler was indicted in September in Paris for illegal taking of interests within the framework of the judicial investigation aimed at his family and professional ties with the shipowner MSC, while the CJR's investigating committee ordered on Monday the dismissal for trial of Éric Dupond-Moretti, suspected of having ordered, shortly after being appointed Minister of Justice, the opening of administrative investigations against magistrates with whom he had had trouble when he was a lawyer .
"The Prime Minister reaffirmed yesterday all the confidence she had in me", thus underlined Éric Dupond-Moretti on the sidelines of a trip to Paris, adding that his indictment, since July 2021, and now his dismissal before the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR) had "never hindered (his) work".
Referred to the Court of Justice of the Republic, Éric Dupond-Moretti assures that his resignation "is not on the agenda" pic.twitter.com/YCCaIg6IyM
– BFMTV (@BFMTV) October 4, 2022
In June 2017, however, Emmanuel Macron's first Keeper of the Seals, François Bayrou, had been forced to resign after his indictment in the case of the fictitious jobs of the parliamentary assistants of the MoDem in the European Parliament, just like Sylvie Goulard ( Minister of the Armed Forces) and Marielle de Sarnez (Secretary of State for European Affairs), also from the MoDem.
Richard Ferrand, then Minister of Territorial Cohesion, had meanwhile had to leave the government after the opening of a preliminary investigation into the Mutuelles de Bretagne affair.
>> To read: What you need to know about the indictment of Alexis Kohler, secretary general of the Élysée
These forced resignations were in phase, five years ago, with the campaign of candidate Emmanuel Macron, who had made the "Exemplary Republic" a leitmotif.
"A minister must leave the government when he is indicted", he said on March 2, 2017 on France 2. His first major law, brought in the spring of 2017 by François Bayrou, precisely, promised moreover a "moralization of public life".
Anticor denounces a "barometer of the acceptability of breaches of probity"
This unwritten rule that a minister indicted should resign, described as "Bérégovoy-Balladur case law", had not already been respected in July 2021, during the indictment of Éric Dupond-Moretti.
It now seems well and truly buried, the resignation of a minister now being a function of the political weight of the said minister and of the media pressure, according to the Élysée.
"It means that there is a kind of barometer of the acceptability of attacks on probity, which in my opinion is unacceptable", regretted Tuesday the president of the anti-corruption association, Élise Van Beneden, estimating that It was now necessary to "put the pressure on to obtain the resignation" of these two senior macronie officials.
>> To read: Dupond-Moretti case: "A Minister of Justice indicted, it's unimaginable"
The opposition did not fail to seize these two cases.
First on social networks, Monday: "Between Kohler and Dupond-Moretti on the same day, President Macron must now choose: to be President of the Republic or clan leader. Faced with the democratic collapse that threatens here as elsewhere, his choices will weigh heavily,” said Green MP Benjamin Lucas on Twitter.
Between #Kohler and #DupondMoretti on the same day, President Macron must now choose: to be President of the Republic or clan leader.
Faced with the democratic collapse that threatens here as elsewhere, its choices will weigh heavily.
— Benjamin LUCAS (@Benjam1Lucas) October 3, 2022
Then during questions to the government, Tuesday, at the Palais Bourbon.
Recalling Emmanuel Macron's position in 2017, Socialist MP Boris Vallaud questioned Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne about the Minister of Justice.
The head of government replied that she did not believe "that it is democratically healthy for decisions of the judicial authority to be commented on here, within the confines of the legislative power, by a member of the executive", being given that "the independence of the judiciary is a cardinal principle of our democracy", as is "the presumption of innocence".
Impeachment of Éric Dupond-Moretti: @BorisVallaud warns against a "conflict of interest" during the appointment of the future Attorney General, appointed by the President of the Republic on the advice of the Keeper of the Seals.#DirectAN #QAG pic.twitter.com/ni8nYPwHsI
— LCP (@LCP) October 4, 2022
The leader of the PS deputies, resuming the floor, then said to see "breaking (...) a conflict of interest in a few months" when the current attorney general at the Court of Cassation François Molins will retire and that "the President of the Republic will appoint a successor to him, on the advice of the Keeper of the Seals", a successor who "will probably have to hear the appeal in cassation of the Keeper of the Seals".
"Mafia Drift of Power"
The public prosecutor at the Court of Cassation represents the prosecution at the CJR, the only body empowered to judge members of the government for crimes or misdemeanors committed in the exercise of their mandate.
"In what democracy can we, in a certain way, participate in the choice of its magistrates?" Asked Boris Vallaud, in the name of a "concern (...) for the independence of justice, respect for all rights, including those of defence" (...) and of presumption of innocence".
Indictment of Éric Dupond-Moretti: "The Keeper of the Seals is not prevented."
@Elisabeth_Borne recalls the existence of a "deportation device" so that there is "no interference" in the follow-up of the files in which the Keeper of the Seals is involved.#DirectAN #QAG pic.twitter.com/ FKrDl3ai89
— LCP (@LCP) October 4, 2022
"The Keeper of the Seals is not prevented, the Ministry of Justice is working", assured him the Prime Minister, recalling the "deportation device" put in place by a decree published in October 2020, by which Éric Dupond- Moretti is barred from all business related to his former activities.
A few minutes later, it was the rebellious deputy Ugo Bernalicis who challenged Élisabeth Borne to explain that Alexis Kohler and Éric Dupond-Moretti had in common "the illegal taking of interests", denouncing in passing a "mafia drift of power" by Emmanuel Macron.
"It is the illegal taking of interests, the power situation of these two people allowed the offense", explains @Ugobernalicis who denounces a "mafia drift of power" with "40 legal cases since 2017".
"It's no longer Jupiter, it's the godfather."
#DirectAN #QAG pic.twitter.com/u6HCXeTurH
— LCP (@LCP) October 4, 2022
The right and the extreme right were not outdone in front of the cameras.
The boss of Les Républicains deputies, Olivier Marleix, denounced "a level of trivialization of the acceptance of cases by the President of the Republic which is unacceptable", considering that the Alexis Kohler affair "illustrates to the highest degree the mixture of genera in macronie".
“It is the problem of slippers that must be put on the table”, estimated for her part the president of the National Rally group Marine Le Pen, on BFMTV, about the accusations weighing on Alexis Kohler, who according to his lawyer “ strongly denies having committed any offence".
The former presidential candidate promises a bill on the subject, criticizing "these senior civil servants who are trained by France and who go into the private sector and then who return to ministerial offices and find themselves almost systematically with a risk conflict of interest".
With AFP
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