French culture minister to go on trial over alleged corruption while an MEP, source says
Dati, 59, who had hoped to run for Paris mayor in next spring's municipal elections, was charged in 2019 on suspicions she lobbied for the Renault-Nissan carmaking group while an MEP. She has denied the allegations and has repeatedly sought without success to have the charges against her quashed.
Dati is accused of accepting €900,000 in lawyer's fees between 2010 and 2012 from a Netherlands-based subsidiary of Renault-Nissan, but of not really working for them. She was an MEP from 2009 to 2019.
Investigations have tried to determine whether she was in fact lobbying in the European parliament for the carmaker, an activity that is forbidden.
Dati, a former minister for the rightwing French president Nicolas Sarkozy, was appointed as culture minister last year in a surprise return to government during Emmanuel Macron's second term in office.
She also serves as the mayor of Paris's 7th arrondissement where she has been a vocal critic of the city's Socialist mayor, Anne Hidalgo.
Dati became the first Muslim woman to hold a major government post in 2007 when she was appointed justice minister during the Sarkozy presidency.
She has said that growing up on a low-income estate on the outskirts of the town of Chalons-sur-Saône, in Burgundy, gave her a greater understanding than most politicians of the French electorate. In 2007, Sarkozy said appointing Dati sent a message 'to all the children of France that with merit and effort everything becomes possible'.
When Dati was appointed to government last year she had already been charged in the Renault-Nissan case. She denied any wrongdoing.
The Socialist party leader, Olivier Faure, said at the time of Dati's appointment that the legal investigation was a problem, saying it sent 'a bad signal' and went against Macron's promises of an 'exemplary' republic.
Investigating magistrates in France have also ordered that Carlos Ghosn, the ex-tycoon of Renault-Nissan, be tried in the case, a judicial source told Agence France-Presse. Ghosn, who has been living in Lebanon for years after escaping arrest in Japan, has also denied the charges against him.
A hearing on 29 September will decide on the date of the trial.
A source following the case told AFP that the trial could be held after the Paris municipal elections, due to be held in March
Ghosn, the former chair and chief executive of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance, was arrested in Japan in November 2018 on suspicion of financial misconduct, before being sacked by Nissan's board in a unanimous decision.
He jumped bail late the following year and made a dramatic escape from Japan hidden in an audio-equipment box, landing in Beirut, where he remains as an international fugitive.
Both Japan and France have sought his arrest.
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Telegraph
8 minutes ago
- Telegraph
The Royal Navy needs to develop a completely new idea of what a warship is
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The Independent
27 minutes ago
- The Independent
Cross-Channel migrants to be detained as France treaty comes into force
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The Guardian
38 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Poland is sliding back towards populism. Democrats elsewhere should heed our mistakes
We were travelling across Poland by train the day after the country's sensational parliamentary elections in autumn 2023. When news of the results came through, passengers in our compartment fell into each other's arms, rejoicing as though a great weight had been lifted from their shoulders. Hard as it was to believe after eight years, the national populists of the Law and Justice party had been ousted from power on a record turnout of 75% of voters. We felt the potential of democracy to change things for the better as a physical sensation. Less than two years have passed but this enthusiasm has disappeared without trace. The Law and Justice-backed candidate Karol Nawrocki won the presidential election run off in June with 50.89% of the vote, securing the admiration of Donald Trump in the process. Days before Nawrocki's swearing in on Wednesday [6 August] a new poll suggested that almost half of voters would like the prime minister, Donald Tusk out. The ruling coalition is wobbling. 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The war against populists is a permanent one, and a global one, amplified by digital media. Post-populist rule is all the more difficult because populist governments leave behind a legal minefield. In Poland, countless legal decisions and acts in force were intended to undermine liberal democratic institutions. Dismantling them constitutionally and restoring the rule of law takes time and energy. It also requires looking back to the past rather than focusing on the future as the new government addresses its predecessors' mistakes. In Poland and Brazil, this has stifled any ambitions to offer an exciting roadmap for the years ahead. Inevitably, any initial euphoria is quickly followed by public frustration and the rise of another challenge from the rightwing populists. Since the anti-communist Solidarity movement in the 1980s, Poland has been a crucial laboratory in the battle for democracy. After returning to power in 2023, Tusk faced a dilemma: should he completely distance himself from his predecessors' agenda or flirt with their legacy? Tusk chose the second option. He maintained the populists' programme of direct financial support for families with children. He continued with the construction of a mega transport hub, a flagship project for the previous government that he had previously attacked as wasteful. It is especially striking that he has failed to liberalise Poland's abortion laws, which were tightened by the populists. Echoing the nationalists' rhetoric about migration and defence of national borders has led to Poland reimposing checks at its borders with EU neighbours Germany and Lithuania, despite all three countries being in the Schengen area. Letting the national populists set the political tone for him is driving Tusk's failure. The defeat of his presidential candidate, Rafał Trzaskowski was followed by a collapse of support in the polls. The absence of an inspiring vision, or even a sense of what Tusk stands for, is painful to witness. If parliamentary elections were held today, Poland's rightwing populists would be emphatically returned to power, probably with an even more radical nationalist programme. Abroad, Tusk may be admired as a staunch defender of democracy. At home, he has become one of the most unpopular politicians in the country. Call it the Gorbachev syndrome: beloved internationally, but reviled domestically. Tusk's ratings slump can be blamed on a whole set of unfulfilled promises, poor messaging and a poor presidential campaign. He is also affected by the global tendency to reject establishment politicians. To many Polish voters, especially younger ones, Tusk, who has been active in Polish politics for more than 25 years and was prime minister from 2007 to 2014, seems like part of a tired old elite whose time has come to step aside. Sign up to This is Europe The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans – from identity to economics to the environment after newsletter promotion Safeguarding democracy requires something liberal democrats have so far lacked: an imaginative conception of what the future should look like. Here, Tusk and Lula disappoint, just as Čaputová and Biden did before them. The message is lacking, but the medium is challenging too. So far, rightwing populists are winning on the battleground of new and social media. It is not the only example, but the Polish case clearly demonstrates the folly of fighting elections purely on the defensive. It is too little and too narrow. Liberal ambitions must extend further than preventing populists from coming to power or removing them from it. Elections have to be understood as a chance to rebuild democracy, and to do so in tune with the new media environment. Without a forward-thinking approach, the liberal intermezzo will remain just that: a brief interval between acts in a longer populist play. Democrats must learn this lesson – contending with populism means not only confronting the past, but also offering a compelling vision for the future. Karolina Wigura is a Polish historian and co-author of Post-Traumatic Sovereignty: An Essay (Why the Eastern European Mentality is Different). Jarosław Kuisz is editor-in-chief of the Polish weekly Kultura Liberalna and the author of The New Politics of Poland: A Case of Post-Traumatic Sovereignty
