A key ally and friend of far-right Front National (FN) president Marine Le Pen faces a judicial probe over allegations concerning the financing of three of the party's election campaigns. Frédéric Chatillon, whose communications company Riwal is the main election services provider for the FN, was held in custody for 48 hours before being placed under formal investigation - one step short of charges - on January 23rd for “fraud”, the “misuse of corporate assets”, “laundering the proceeds of the misuse of corporate assets”, “forgery” and “use of false instruments”.
The formal investigation of Chatillon arises from a judicial probe triggered in April 2014 by France's election spending watchdog the Commission nationale des comptes de campagne et des financements politiques (CNCCFP). That judge-led investigation is into claims of “forgery and use of false instruments” and “conspiracy to commit fraud” and centres on the financing of the FN's campaigns in the local elections in 2011 and the parliamentary elections for 2012. At the request of the prosecution authorities the investigation was widened in September 2014 to include the 2012 presidential campaign, at which Marine Le Pen stood as a candidate, and claims of misuse of corporate assets and conspiracy to launder money.
The two examining magistrates carrying out this probe, Renaud Van Ruymbeke and Aude Buresi, are focussing their attentions on two organisations. One is Chatillon's firm Riwal, which produces election material for the FN and makes the campaign kits used by its candidates. The other is Marine Le Pen's 'micro party' called Jeanne, which is essentially a funding vehicle that lends the party's candidates funds for their election campaign expenses, with the candidates then getting their expenses reimbursed by the state under French election laws once the campaign is over. Jeanne - named in honour of Joan of Arc ('Jeanne d'Arc' in French)- also sells the election kits supplied by Riwal to the candidates.
Among the issues being examined by the judges is the 450,000 euro loan from the micro party to Le Pen's own presidential campaign in 2012 at the exceptionally high interest rate of 7%, which pocketed the organisation some 19,000 euros. As Mediapart has already reported (see here in French), some loan agreements may have been falsified or pre-dated. In 2012 Jeanne, whose treasurer Axel Loustau is a very close ally of Chatillon, received a total of 9 million euros.
Enlargement : Illustration 1
When questioned by French news agency AFP about the affair, Marine Le Pen said she was “not legally involved” with it. “I have not been questioned. I have absolutely no idea what's going on in this affair. Legally it does not involve me.” Le Pen continued: “Obviously I'm not going to tell you that I don't know Frédéric and that I don't know the way in which the financing of the different candidates through Jeanne was – in a legal manner – put in place, or that Riwal was the supplier of the candidates' campaign kits, but on the substantive point this procedure, which goes back a certain number of years, has once again been validated by the Commission nationale des comptes de campagne et des financements politiques which has reimbursed all the candidates at the local elections [editor's note, in 2014].”
When questioned about the opening of a formal investigation into her friend in particular, she replied: “Finally! For months now there's been an investigation that has been done without supervision, the necessary controls. He will at last be able to have access to the file, to know what the grounds are and to be able to provide explanations,” said Marine Le Pen. “So far one has read anything and everything in the press, I think it's healthier that the procedures are respected allowing, if you will, defence rights to be respected.”
Back in April 2014, when the initial investigation was launched, Marine Le Pen said on Twitter: “Inquiries, judicial investigations, searches, the socialist government doesn't lack imagination faced with its political opposition.” She later added: “It will end, as it does each time, with no further action or an acquittal in a few months, but the slander will have done its job.”
In the autumn of 2014 friends of Frédéric Chatillon told Mediapart that he was going to Rome to “take a break” and launch Riwal in Italy, and that he would not be back in Paris “before 2017”. In the 1990s Chatillon, who is an old friend of Marine Le Pen's, was president of the Groupe Union Défense (GUD), a students group on the extreme right. He is also a supporter of the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria. In 2011 his activities were flagged by Tracfin, the anti-money laundering unit at the French ministry of finance, and a fraud squad investigation was launched into money that he had received from the Syrian regime. The investigation ended in April 2012 with no further action or charges being brought.
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The French version of this article can be found here.
English version by Michael Streeter