All the legal problems of Sarkozy
Sarkozy, the prosecution asks for six months in prison in the Bygmalion affair. Enrico Martial's article
On Thursday 17 June, the prosecution asked for one year of detention including six months with parole and six months in prison to serve for the former French president , Nicolas Sarkozy. This is the Bygmalion affair, financing the 2012 electoral campaign, in which the socialist François Hollande then won, and for which another 13 people were involved, with requests ranging from 18 months to 4 years with conditional, accompanied by pecuniary sanctions.
According to the prosecution and as confirmed by some of the defendants, the spending limit set by law at 22.5 million euros for a candidate in the second round of the presidential elections was largely exceeded, almost doubling. To stay within the limits, a system of false invoicing would then have been put in place, charging the UMP party (which later became Les Républicains) the amounts above the threshold, for meetings and events that largely did not take place, for a total of 18.5 million euros. Sarkozy would not have been involved, but he would have benefited from the whole operation.
For a two-month election campaign, this was a huge expense, although there have been complaints about the cost of politics for years. Even then there were protests about the size and organization of Sarkozy's events: that of Villepinte, on 11 March 2012, with a spectacular stage, specially created music, concert instruments, thousands of flags and people, would have cost alone 6 million euros. Bygmalion, the communications company that was in charge of the organization, through its Events & C. Branch, was initially contacted for 5-6 meetings, which later became 15 to reach a total of 44, while Hollande organized "only" 10. .
In France, for years the eyes have widened to understand how this could have happened. The story emerged from journalistic inquiries. Initially, on February 27, 2014, it was the weekly Le Point , which warned of a “affaire François Copé”, then secretary of the UMP, who would take advantage of campaign expenses to build a treasure. Copé filed a complaint, and would later win a libel trial, but unleashed the free all. With Liberation and Le Parisien, the total amount came out, which was actually used to finance the campaign. On May 26, 2014, under pressure, Jérôme Levrilleux, deputy director of the campaign, in a difficult interview on BFM TV , took his share of responsibility and explained the essence of the story, without involving either Nicolas Sarkozy or François Copé. In the Bygmalion trial these days, the latter has only assisted as a witness and not as a defendant. In the investigation that followed, the accounts were then recovered, stored on a USB stick.
In the midst of human factors, even positive ones, of distancing and expressions of dignity that are understood in the context of the French culture of politics, there are also irritable rages and conflicts. That campaign was an attempt to catch up on the delay that Sarkozy had in the polls compared to Hollande: the first meetings gave indications of recovery, even if they were not enough. Sarkozy had chosen to lead the campaign men from the staff of the UMP secretary, François Copé, with whom he did not get along, whom he considered already oriented towards defeat and whom he instead wanted actively to involve. Bygmalion was a communications company of former Copé collaborators, the deputy head of the campaign Jérôme Lerilleux was his cabinet chief.
Thus, in the process, the contrast between the two re-emerged: Sarkozy hinted that Copé might know, that someone earned that money, Copé that it was Sarkozy who ultimately benefited from it. In short, a bad-bad climate, for a party that has then changed its name and is preparing for the presidential elections of 2022, pulled by the jacket towards radical right-wing content or towards more "republican" and centrist positions, and without a real candidate common. Sarkozy could have been, always a friend of the French media tycoon, François Bolloré, and who in any case still has a position in the country, but who has already been sentenced on 1 March 2021 to three years, two with parole and one to be served ( now it will go on appeal) to the “listening” trial or Bismuth, another bad story this time for “influence trafficking” and “active corruption”.
Of great interest is the relationship between the other 13 people, who are all first level, who have occupied important staff functions, in the municipalities, in the government, in the party. Everyone tried to come out, "there are 14 different versions" was heard in the classroom, with some coincidences for the four who admitted at least part of the facts.
Then there is the court and the education, which got its hands on the USB stick in which there were the accounts, with the total of the campaign, the one then placed in charge of the association of organization bound to the maximum threshold and the one with the costs turned over to the UMP, which would then find itself with the tills in red.
And then there is the public, and the newspapers, in a France uncertain at the end of the health crisis, which still experiences a composite climate of protest, from the legacy of the yellow vests to the radical right-wing campaigns on Eric Zemmour's CNews, to Thierry Mariani, a pro-Chinese and pro-Putin Lepenian candidate at the head of the polls for the elections of 20 and 27 June in the Southern Region of Marseille.
Even in the necessary search for truth and in respect of legality, not even the majority benefit in the short term from the degradation of the public image of public figures and of a party – now Les Republicains – so important in the history of the Fifth Republic, and with which works, between contrasts and collaborations. It is a complicated situation in which the reassuring and necessarily uncertain effort of Emmanuel Macron, the current President of the Republic, tries to exert himself. The regional elections are held this Sunday, for the first round.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/tutte-le-grane-giudiziarie-di-sarkozy/ on Fri, 18 Jun 2021 07:38:25 +0000.