En juin, Chirac va-t-il perdre son impunité ?

Pour rompre un peu l'euphorie de l'annonce du départ de Jacques Chirac, il a fallu un journal étranger pour rappeler quelques réalités judiciaires.

L'article du International Herald Tribune.

Unresolved scandals await Chirac's departure

By Katrin Bennhold
Published: March 14, 2007

PARIS: When President Jacques Chirac leaves office in May, a fat legal file carrying his name will come out of a safe at a court in the Paris suburb of Nanterre and land on the desk of Judge Alain Philibeaux.

A dormant party-financing case in Nanterre, which focuses on the time when Chirac, 74, was mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995, is the most serious of a number of scandals that could catch up with him when he loses immunity from prosecution accorded the head of state.

Two judges familiar with the case said that it is "extremely likely" that Philibeaux, one of France's most senior investigators of financial crime, will summon Chirac for questioning as early as June over allegations that he was involved in an intricate kickback scheme in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The judges, who declined to be identified because the investigation is continuing, said Chirac probably would not be called as a regular witness, but as an "assisted witness," accompanied by his lawyers because the testimony concerns allegations against him.

In a move some commentators interpreted as an effort to protect himself, Chirac has appointed three key political allies to judicial posts. Last week he made Philippe Courroye, a judge described as being close to Chirac's Gaullist camp, the public prosecutor who oversees investigations at the Nanterre tribunal. Last year, he appointed Laurent Le Mesle, his former justice adviser, as public prosecutor for Paris, where at least one other corruption investigation is pending. Last month he named Jean-Louis Debré, the former speaker of the National Assembly, president of the powerful constitutional council.

Chirac's case will be a test for France's judicial system, which has long faced criticism for ties with the political class. Scandals, financial or otherwise, have been a regular feature in administrations of all political colors, but few of them have made it to the courtroom and even fewer resulted in high-level convictions. Judges insisting on their independence have sometimes claimed to be the victims of intimidation.

"If Chirac is pursued, as every regular citizen would be, it would create a powerful precedent," one of the judges familiar with the Nanterre case said. "For starters, it would affect the way future presidents act."

Chirac has denounced as "lies, calumny and manipulation" all allegations of wrongdoing. But during his 12- year presidency, accusations of fictional employees, forged electoral lists and suitcases filled with cash linked to his tenure as mayor have surfaced. Five corruption trials have taken place over the last decade. Some of Chirac's closest associates were convicted, including Alain Juppé, who was prime minister from 1995 to 1997. Juppé was also Chirac's No. 2 in City Hall and received a 14-month suspended prison sentence in 2004 for his involvement in the same party-funding scandal now hanging over Chirac.

That scandal, involving a kickback scheme in which the names of members of Chirac's Gaullist party appeared on the payrolls of municipal services and companies that donated money to the party in the form of salaries, remains the most dangerous one for Chirac, lawyers say.

In 1999, Philibeaux's predecessor in Nanterre, Patrick Desmure, said he had evidence that appeared to link Chirac personally to the case.

But the constitutional court upheld Chirac's immunity and the Supreme Court confirmed the decision in 2001.

One piece of evidence reported to be in Chirac's Nanterre file is a letter, dated March 13, 1993, and signed by Chirac, in which he sought the promotion of a secretary in the city government, citing the "exemplary devotion" she showed in her "delicate role" in the Gaullist party.

If Philibeaux picks up where Desmure left off, that letter — extracts of which were reprinted in Le Monde this week — could be enough to trigger a formal investigation of Chirac, lawyers say.

The letter adds weight to a videotape made in 1996 by the man who admitted to directing illegal financing at the Gaullist party headed by Chirac from 1976 to 1994.

In the tape, Jean-Claude Méry, said that he had personally handed 5 million francs in cash to Chirac in 1986. The tape surfaced only after Méry's death in 1999.

There is no certainty that Chirac's successor will be eager to see him pursued, analysts said.

"Nobody wants to investigate Chirac, but no one wants to be seen to be protecting him either," said Roland Dumas, a former foreign minister who was himself the target of a corruption investigation. "There will be a few gestures and then the whole thing will peter out and come to nothing."

Bruno Jeanbart, head of political research at the OpinionWay polling company said that even though Chirac was unpopular, French public opinion would not want to see him pursued.

"Whoever wins will not touch a former president," Jeanbart said. "Public opinion would never accept that. French voters can dislike a president but would not want to see his honor dragged through the mud."

Indeed, none of Chirac's potential successors has expressed any great appetite to see him pursued.

"I don't think it honors France to go looking for trouble with a president who is no longer in office," Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a member of the campaign team of Ségolène Royal, the Socialist candidate, recently told LCI
television.

International Herald Tribune