Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id KAA02448 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 1 Jun 2001 10:59:14 +0100 Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3101745EC8@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: le corruption Date: Fri, 1 Jun 2001 10:55:32 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
The thing about France is that it's been part of the political culture there
for a long time. The now forgotten crisis in the European Commission that
occurred shortly before the Kosovan War started, also rested on French
nepotism, and resultant incompetence and possible corruption amongst
comissioners.
It's not helped by the general lack of investigative journalism in France.
You'd never see a Lewinsky style scandal in France a) because the French
press wouldn't consider it proper to report it, b) even if they did try,
strict privacy laws protecting public figures would no doubt be employed,
and c) if it was still published most of the French public would see nothing
wrong with a political leader having a bit on the side, or with them being
given a cushy job.
The shock in France over Dumas, is not so much about what he did, but that
he and his woman got sent down.
C'est la vie...
Vincent
> ----------
> From: Wade T.Smith
> Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Sent: Friday, June 1, 2001 3:03 am
> To: Memetics Discussion List
> Subject: le corruption
>
> Hi-
>
> This seems slightly timely, as least as far as that dwindled talk of
> corruption is concerned....
>
> It seems as rampant in France as I suspected it was everywhere else....
>
> "In fact, investigations into corruption are now so numerous that earlier
> this year, one prominent Socialist, Bertrand Delanoë, who is now mayor of
> Paris, summed up the situation by saying that if all those accused were
> convicted, French politics would "be an empty field.""
>
> - Wade
>
> **************
>
> May 31, 2001
>
> Former French Official Found Guilty in Sweeping Graft Case
>
> By SUZANNE DALEY
>
> PARIS, May 30 < A Paris court sentenced the flamboyant former foreign
> minister, Roland Dumas, to six months in jail today and also convicted
> four co-defendants in a huge corruption case that has shaken France's
> political establishment and transfixed the public with its heady
> revelations of sex, power and greed among the once-revered elite.
>
> Today's result seems sure to send shivers down the spines of dozens of
> prominent officials from all across the political spectrum who are
> currently under investigation. Even President Jacques Chirac is fighting
> allegations that he masterminded a vast illicit fund-raising scheme when
> he was mayor of Paris.
>
> The conviction of Mr. Dumas, who was also ordered to pay a $130,000 fine,
> and other powerful associates of the late President François Mitterrand
> was a victory for a new aggressive group of investigating magistrates. In
> recent years, they have opened dozens of investigations into corruption
> and exposed the way business and politics intersected for decades here.
>
> Throughout the case, prosecutors argued that Mr. Dumas, now 78, had
> arranged for his mistress to get a job at an oil company, Elf Aquitaine,
> which was then state-owned, and then benefited from the nearly $9 million
> that the company showered on her between 1989 and 1993. Later privatized,
> Elf Aquitaine found that some of the Mitterrand appointees who had run it
> while it was state- owned had siphoned off more than $250 million,
> company executives charged later. Elf later merged with other companies
> as TotalFinaElf.
>
> The court ruled today that Mr. Dumas had illegally received gifts and
> cash from Elf. Four of his co- defendants, including his former mistress,
> Christine Deviers-Joncour, also were convicted of corruption and received
> jail sentences.
>
> Mr. Dumas, silver-haired and sharp-tongued, was belligerent through much
> of the trial. At one point he threatened to "take care" of the
> investigating magistrates when the case was over. But today, he left the
> courtroom without speaking.
>
> His lawyer, Jean-René Farthouat, nevertheless, claimed a victory of
> sorts, noting that Mr. Dumas' sentence was considerably more lenient than
> the two-year jail sentence requested by the prosecutors. In addition, Mr.
> Dumas, who had to step down as head of the French Constitutional Court to
> face the charges, was not convicted on all counts.
>
> "There is reason to think that we are taking the case apart piece by
> piece," Mr. Farthouat said, adding that Mr. Dumas would appeal. "A house
> does not fall all in one go." Ms. Deviers-Joncour, who wrote a book about
> her years as Mr. Dumas' lover titled "Whore of the Republic," was
> sentenced to 18 months in jail and fined the equivalent of about
> $200,000. Ms. Deviers-Joncour, 53, had showered Mr. Dumas with gifts,
> including a $1,700 pair of shoes and antique Greek statuettes worth about
> $40,000.
>
> Ms. Deviers-Joncour, a former underwear model who maintained throughout
> the trial that she had merely been a pawn in tangled politics she did not
> understand, seemed on the verge of tears as she hurried from the
> courtroom.
>
> Another co-defendant, Loïk Le Floch-Prigent, a former chairman of Elf,
> was handed a three-and-a-half- year prison term and a $260,000 fine.
>
> Another former Elf executive, Alfred Sirven, who was on the run during
> most of the trial and refused to defend himself when he was finally
> tracked down and extradited from the Philippines, received a four-year
> prison term and a $260,000 fine.
>
> The Dumas case was one of the first of the recent, more vigorous
> prosecutions of corruption to reach the courts. For decades, allegations
> of corruption among public officials were rarely pursued with much vigor.
> But in the last five years all that has been changing. Magistrates have
> laid bare a culture of corruption in France's political ranks, where
> kickbacks and ghost jobs for friends and family members appear to have
> been routine.
>
> Their tactics have often been tough; police officers have searched
> government ministers' homes and hauled even the most well-connected
> members of the elite < including Mr. Mitterrand's son < off to jail for
> questioning.
>
> Ms. Deviers-Joncour and Mr. Le Floch-Prigent spent months in jail for
> refusing to answer questions.
>
> There are dozens of similar cases presently hanging fire.
>
> Investigators are still looking into allegations that Mr. Chirac's former
> ally, Jean Tiberi, rigged votes and provided ghost jobs. And another
> former Chirac ally, Charles Pasqua, is being investigated for his role in
> illegal arms sales.
>
> On the other side of the political aisle, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a
> former finance minister under the Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin,
> is scheduled to go on trial this year on charges that he backdated
> documents to hide an illegal payment.
>
> He is also being investigated for giving tax breaks in exchange for a
> copy of a videotaped confession that charges Mr. Chirac with
> masterminding a vast kickback scheme when he was mayor of Paris between
> 1977 and 1995.
>
> Mr. Strauss-Kahn apparently never did anything with the cassette, but it
> came to light recently anyway. The tape was made by a former Chirac aide
> who has since died. But the aide's confession has apparently been
> buttressed by other witnesses. The investigating magistrate in the case
> recently filed papers with the court saying he had "credible evidence"
> against Mr. Chirac. But he acknowledged that his hands were tied because
> as president Mr. Chirac enjoys immunity from prosecution.
>
> Still, Mr. Chirac is now facing a small, but growing movement in
> Parliament to impeach him.
>
> In fact, investigations into corruption are now so numerous that earlier
> this year, one prominent Socialist, Bertrand Delanoë, who is now mayor of
> Paris, summed up the situation by saying that if all those accused were
> convicted, French politics would "be an empty field."
>
> The Dumas trial opened in January and never lacked drama. Ms.
> Deviers-Joncour often cried. Mr. Dumas often made speeches and a key
> co-defendant, Mr. Sirven, could not be found. For weeks, all the
> defendants seemed to blame the missing man for just about everything that
> happened.
>
> But halfway through the trial, authorities found Mr. Sirven. However,
> once he arrived in Paris, Mr. Sirven, who once bragged he knew enough
> about corrupt French officials "to bring down the Republic 20 times," did
> not make good on his threat. He refused to testify and sat out the trial
> in La Santé prison in Paris, where he remains.
>
> Two defendants in the case were acquitted yesterday. Both were lesser
> executives at Elf, Andre Tarallo and Jean-Claude Vauchez. But a
> businessman who was also a former boyfriend of Ms. Deviers-Joncour,
> Gilbert Miara, was found guilty of fraud and given an 18-month sentence
> and a $130,000 fine.
>
> Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company
>
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