The French prosecutor’s office began investigating Marine Le Pen’s party against the suspect. embezzlement of 600 thousand euros Funds from the European Parliament. At the beginning of March, French magistrates received a report from the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) accusing the National Regrouping (RN, called the National Front until 2018) of taking significant sums of money from the European Parliament. As announced on Saturday by the digital newspaper ‘Mediapart’. This information is another hurdle for the far-right candidate in the final part of his presidential campaign, where he will face President Emmanuel Macron in the runoff on April 24.
The prosecution is examining this report, in which Le Pen is accused of embezzlement. Between 2004 and 2017 137,000 Euros, when he served as an MEP. OCLAF also blames his father Jean-Marie LePenHe is the founder of this far-right formation, which in 2012 allocated about 303,000 euros from the European parliamentary activity for which these subsidies are intended, for personal or partisan purposes.
The strong report accuses ultra MEPs of over-billing, financing party activities with continental subsidies, diverting funds through fictitious orders to satellite companies, or paying in European currency for products for purely personal use, such as purchased by part of Jean. by Marie Le Pen 129 bottles of wine and champagne The luxury brands will celebrate a New Year’s Eve party at their mansion in Paris in 2016. Ultra candidate’s lawyer, Rodolphe Bosselut, criticized the “coincidence” with a “run-off campaign” with the publication of this information.
Macron slightly expands his leadership
This is not the first ‘issue’ with the embezzlement of European funds splashed on the nationalist Le Pen. The RN leader had already been accused in 2018 He demanded the restitution of around 300,000 euros for the “diversion of public funds” for allegedly using the parliamentary assistants in the European Parliament for partisan purposes. However, being involved in corruption cases and other questionable matters, such as getting two loans from Russian banks, does not usually affect Le Pen’s voting intentions, as he takes second place in the first round with more than 23% of the vote.
According to the latest polls, Macron will win in the second round with 55 percent of the vote, while Le Pen will receive 45 percent. although a much narrower distance In 2017—then the centrist leader won with 66%—last week slightly increased his advantage.
When the campaign focused on the duel between the two finalists, the RN leader lost the argumentative excellent lightning rod. Eric Zemmour. The French press has focused much more on criticizing the unconstitutional nature of some of its key promises, such as “national priority” that would deprive foreigners of welfare benefits. He was also thwarted by his radical proposal. ban Islamic hijab in the public arena, a nuanced measure by his party’s leaders this weekend.
Left-wing voter as referee
Thanks to all his communication tricks, the reptilian Le Pen has based his entire campaign on stopping being scary. In this way, he aims to turn the elections into a referendum against the centrist leader. Speaking at a rally in Avignon, in the south of France, on Thursday, the Minister said, “I think it’s another task from Macron that poses a risk to the country.” “A lot of French people in these elections they will not vote in favor of a projectbut against the other”, regrets the statements of political scientist Jean-Yves Camus, director of the Jean-Jaurès Foundation’s Observatory for Political Radicals, to El Periódico about the Socialist Party.
A democratic cordon to prevent the far right from coming to power. Or a protest front against the centrist leader. What will have an unexpected arbiter is the electoral dilemma of a significant portion of the electorate: the left-wing voter, particularly the rebel Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is almost third with almost 22%.
After rivers of ink have flowed about the controversial theory in recent years France’s right wing – the neighboring country appears to be split into almost identical three blocs (a liberal centre, a nationalist far right and a socio-ecological left) rather than being more conservative – progressive voters will have the final say in Macron’s iteration – Le Pen. It is the third time in the last two decades that a far-right candidate is competing in the second round. Contrary to the traumatic qualification Jean-Marie Le Pen received for the 2002 election final, there was no electroshock in French society this time around.
less than 23,000 people On Saturday they held protests against the far-right in various places called by unions and progressive organizations such as Greenpeace or the Human Rights League. This low turnout reflects the fatigue of some of the French before the election gesture for the candidate facing the far-right.