The MoDem and the UDF were indicted in December for “complicity and concealment of embezzlement of public funds”, we learned on January 6.
The Union for French Democracy (UDF) was absorbed by the Democratic Movement (MoDem), but it retains a legal existence. These two centrist parties are suspected of having paid people working for their movement with European funds, passing them off as parliamentary assistants to MEPs.
“We note that the indictment of the UDF and the Modem intervene in the middle of the presidential campaign”, responded Master Francis Teitgen, lawyer for both parties. “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.”
This case has been the subject of an investigation since March 2017 by the investigating judges of the financial center of the Paris judicial court. Since the opening of the judicial investigation, fifteen elected officials, executives or former party executives have been prosecuted. Among them: the president of the MoDem François Bayrou, the former Minister of Justice Michel Mercier, and MEPs Sylvie Goulard, Nathalie Griesbeck and Jean-Luc Bennahmias.
Almost five years of investigation
The indictment of the MoDem and the UDF suggests a closure of the investigations. An almost five-year investigation could therefore come to an end in the coming months.
The investigations had begun after the denunciation of a former elected member of the National Front, Sylvie Montel, on fictitious jobs of her colleagues from all sides, including those of the Modem. These revelations had greatly weakened the centrist party. For example, they had 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 the government of Emmanuel Macron.
The Modem has always claimed its innocence. Its leader, François Bayrou, indicted in December 2019, said in a letter that he had “never used fictitious jobs”. This is not the opinion of a report by the Anti-Corruption Office. Rendered in April 2021, the office in charge of the investigations estimates that the MoDem has set up “an old and more or less informal system” of embezzlement of European funds to pay its employees. The loss of the European Parliament is estimated at 1.4 million euros.