Nicolas Sarkozy is to stand trial over allegations of illegally financing his failed 2012 re-election bid , according to reports, reports Sky News.
The prosecution claims the former French president went over the €22.5m (£19.4m) spending limit by using false billing from a public relations firm called Bygmalion.
A judicial source told Reuters that 13 others would also face trial over the affair, which has involved charges of spending overruns and funding irregularities.
Another told AFP one of the two judges in charge of the case, Serge Tournaire, decided last week that the case should go to trial after the failure of Sarkozy's legal efforts to prevent it in December.
Bygmalion allegedly charged €18.5m (£15.9m) to Mr Sarkozy's UMP party, which has since been renamed the Republicans, instead of billing his campaign.
Company executives have acknowledged the existence of fraud and false accounting, and the trial will focus on whether Mr Sarkozy himself was aware of what was going on.
When he was questioned by police in September 2015, Mr Sarkozy said he did not remember being warned about the accounting and described the controversy as a "farce".
Read more of this report from Sky News.
Read Mediapart's coverage of the affair here.