2023-10-18 22:49:37
“You know, I’m an old guy”good-naturedly launches Bernard Lehideux, François Bayrou’s historic traveling companion at the Union for French Democracy (UDF) then at the Democratic Movement (MoDem) and former centrist European deputy, by advancing in front of the president of the 11th correctional chamber from Paris, Gérald Begranger, Wednesday October 18, to answer his questions in the parliamentary assistants affair.
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And like almost all the others, he puts forward a defense which denies any illegal nature to the contracts he signed to employ, on his MEP credits, people who worked for the centrist party. Mr. Lehideux thus paid, as an assistant, the blogger enjoying a certain reputation at the time, Quitterie de Villepin – “a bubbling young activist, perhaps a little too much”, or Karine A., also secretary in Paris of the party of François Bayrou and Marielle de Sarnez (died in early 2021). However, neither of them remembers having worked concretely for Mr. Lehideux. And there is no written record to prove it.
Not enough to destabilize Bernard Lehideux: Quitterie de Villepin, he had hired her part-time in 2006 to “contact with the departmental party federations”. A job over which he only had distant supervision: “When I was in Paris, I visited the UDF and saw everyone. » Asked about the fact that Ms. de Villepin – who says she mainly worked on the 2007 presidential election – could have been employed by several MEPs at the same time, to the point of providing her with a full-time equivalent, he dodges by assuring that he does not had little time to devote to these questions.
As for Karine A., if he ended up paying her for a few months, it was a way of thanking her: “she was doing me a favor” by carrying out some logistical tasks, “I told myself one day that it wasn’t right to use his kindness, and I made him a contract”. Contract whose title relates to legal research work far removed from her skills as an executive assistant. “It was the standard contract, consent M. Lehideux, I promised him, I signed it. »
“It’s the ball of the frustrated”
Since the start of the trial, Monday October 16, the eleven defendants from the Bayrou clan stand together, hammering out the same arguments: nothing illegal in these jobs granted to party officials, but an optimization of resources made possible by a European regulation so complex that even the court struggles to interpret it . At the start of the hearing, Wednesday, Anne Laperrouze, another MEP who employs Ms. De Villepin and Karine A., declined the same speech, like MEP Thierry Cornillet the day before: “the local assistants were based in Paris to benefit from the UDF network” and worked together on a « task force » intended to promote the work of centrist MEPs.
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