Detectives from the French anti-corruption police unit OCLCIFF, working under the authority of judges Serge Tournaire and Aude Buresi, the examining magistrates in charge of the judicial investigation into the suspected illegal funding by late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi of Nicolas Sarkozy’s 2007 presidential election campaign, have been told by former campaign staff of the regular use of cash sums by their management, notably for the payment of wages.
Several suspects and witnesses in the case have been questioned by police, including Éric Woerth, the conservative mayor of Chantilly and MP who was treasurer of both Sarkozy’s 2007 campaign and also the UMP party (now renamed Les Républicains) who Sarkozy represented. Woerth, who Sarkozy made budget minister after his election, denied having knowledge of funding from a foreign government. But he did confirm that large quantities of cash circulated at the campaign headquarters on the rue d’Enghien in central Paris.
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Paris-based arms broker and businessmen Ziad Takieddine, who was a key intermediary in Sarkozy’s dealings with Gaddafi and Middle East regimes, has previously told the investigation that in November and December 2006 he delivered cash sums from the Gaddafi regime directly to Claude Guéant, Sarkozy’s longstanding chief-of-staff and future director of his presidential campaign, and to Sarkozy himself, who was then interior minister.
The latest investigations centre on establishing the use that was made of cash sums for day-to-day business by campaign managers, and unaccounted for in the official bookkeeping at Sarkozy’s HQ.
In January, police questioned Jérôme Lavrilleux, who was deputy director of Sarkozy’s 2012 re-election campaign, which ended with defeat at the hands of his socialist opponent François Hollande. Lavrilleux, who has been placed under investigation in a separate probe into fake invoicing of the 2012 campaign, which hid spending that far exceeded the legal limit, told police that members of Sarkozy’s conservative UMP party, had informed him that they were paid in cash for bonuses due to them after the successful 2007 election campaign.
Speaking to Mediapart, Lavrilleux said the cash bonuses were “equivalent to between one and three months’ salary”. He also suggested that the startling contrast in declared spending on Sarkozy’s two campaigns – which totalled 20 million euros in 2007 and 50 million euros in 2012 – could be explained by the use of cash sums during the first.
Vincent Talvas, a former financial and administrative director of the UMP party, who was deputy treasurer during the 2007 campaign, was brought into custody for questioning last week, when his home was searched.
Other former staff of Sarkozy’s campaign were questioned, notably Nathalie Gonzalez-Prado, who was Claude Guéant’s secretary at the campaign headquarters, whose home was also searched, along with Chantal Spano, a member of Nicolas Sarkozy’s communications team, headed by Franck Louvrier.
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A number of former campaign staff confirmed that they had been paid in cash at the end of the campaign, and that some of the sums were of several thousand euros. “Talvas and Woerth were in charge of these things with Guéant,” one of them said. He recalled that the campaign headquarters was composed of an open-space work area for most of the staff, while senior managers of the campaign were on a separate floor, where the treasury was situated alongside the offices of Guéant and Sarkozy.
In October 2014, a former staffer recruited in February 2007 by the campaign’s finance association told police that he had been paid a part of his wages in cash, presented as “an advance”. Kamel E (last name withheld) recounted that he was interviewed for the job by Éric Woerth. “He passed me a blank sheet of paper and asked me to write down what wage I wanted,” he said in his statement.”I asked him for 2,000 euros. He told me that that was not possible, but that 1,500 euros was.” Kamel E. was hired as a member of the UMP’s communications team, based at the party’s headquarters on the rue de la Boétie in central Paris, where he was tasked with preparing Sarkozy’s meetings. While he was officially paid by both the UMP and the campaign finance association, he said his wage slips on several occasions were for a sum that was three times less than his agreed remuneration, in which case he was given the remainder in cash.
The handing over of the cash sums took place in the office of Vincent Talvas, at the UMP offices on the rue de la Boétie. “There was a cabinet that contained cash,” recalled Kamel E. “It was a grey cabinet the size of a man and about 1.5 metres large. Inside this cabinet were wads of banknotes of all denominations, notes of 10, 20, and 50 [euros]. The wads were placed on just one shelf.”
Questioned in 2015, Claude Guéant told police that he was “very surprised” that cash sums to top-up wages could have been made under his authority. “The campaign treasurer was Éric Woerth, but I don’t know who was the person who looked after wages,” Guéant said. “I never saw cash at the campaign headquarters.”
Guéant was questioned about a safe he rented from the BNP bank during the 2007 Sarkozy campaign. The safe was rented out in 2007 between March 21st and July 31st.
“It was for keeping in security, which was not the case at the campaign headquarters, personal archives belonging to Mr. Sarkozy and myself which came from our duties at the [interior] ministry.” Guéant said the safe was used only to store a small tin trunk of documents. According to the bank, Guéant visited the safe on seven occasions, which he told police was “to consult documents”, adding: “I think of speeches that Mr. Sarkozy could have made.” Asked whether he did not have computer archives of such speeches, Guéant told the police that he “did not work like that at the time”.
Guéant is currently placed under investigation over a secret payment he received in 2008 of 500,000 euros, suspected of coming from funds provided by Libya.
In February 2012, Éric Woerth was placed under investigation on suspicion of receiving and handling illegal funds for Sarkozy’s 2007 campaign which were allegedly taken from accounts belonging to L’Oréal heiress and billionaire Liliane Bettencourt. He was also placed under investigation for influence peddling, in relation to the hiring of his wife as an investment advisor by Patrice de Maistre, head of Bettencourt’s wealth investment firm Clymène, who was awarded the Légion d’honneur by Woerth. He was subsequently charged and sent for trial on both counts, but the two cases were thrown out by Bordeaux court judges in May 2015. In their ruling explaining the dismissal of the case against Woerth for handling illegal political funds, the judges wrote: “There exists strong suspicion of a payment of money from Bettencourt funds, but without the demonstration of the [making of the] payment being entirely obtained.”
Contacted by Mediapart during the preparation of this article, Woerth refused to discuss his recent questioning, adding that he was fully taken up with preparing next month’s legislative elections.
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The French version of this article can be found here.
English version by Graham Tearse