A trial for corruption is required against the Minister of Culture. She is suspected of having received 900,000 euros from the Renault-Nissan alliance without any real work in return, which could mask lobbying activity in the European Parliament. Rachida Dati rejects these accusations.
Rachida Dati is in legal turmoil. The National Financial Prosecutor’s Office requested, on Wednesday November 13, a trial before the criminal court for corruption and influence peddling, we learned on Friday November 15 from the public prosecutor’s office, reports BFMTV. The current Minister of Culture is accused in the context of the Carlos Ghosn affair, the former boss of the Renault-Nissan group, currently the subject of an international arrest warrant and on the run in Lebanon.
Rachida Dati is suspected of having received 900,000 euros from RNBV (a subsidiary of the Renault-Nissan group) without compensation for real work, between 2010 and 2012. At the time, she was a lawyer and European MP (2009 -2019), substitute member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy. If the minister justifies these payments of money by work as a lawyer (900 hours), the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office sees this as a possible means of hiding lobbying activity in the European Parliament. It is in this same case that Carlos Ghosn has been targeted, since April 2023, by an international arrest warrant.
Two appeals rejected by the Court of Cassation
The accusations against Rachida Dati are not new. The minister was indicted for “passive corruption”, “passive influence peddling”, “concealment of abuse of power” and “concealment of trust” since 2021. Rachida Dati had pleaded for the statute of limitations to be taken before the Court of cassation. As a reminder, it is the highest court in the judiciary and the last avenue of appeal to contest a court decision. As informed us The World Last month, the Court of Cassation dismissed two appeals from Rachida Dati, on October 7 and 14.
As a reminder, this affair, which is known as the “Carlos Ghosn affair”, began in November 2018, when the CEO of the automobile firm was arrested in Japan, then indicted in December for having concealed certain Nissan revenues from the stock market authorities. Japanese. He was also charged with “aggravated breach of trust” in April 2019. He then managed to flee from Japan to Lebanon at the end of December 2019. What followed was a long series of investigations and indictments around the world. , Japan, France, the Netherlands, the United States, Switzerland, Brazil, Dubai, Oman…
What does Rachida Dati risk?
It is important to understand that, for the moment, no trial is planned against the Minister of Culture, it is simply required. We can take as an example the case of the former Minister of Justice, Éric Dupond-Moretti, who was prosecuted for “illegal taking of interest”. He continued to serve as Minister of Justice during the legal proceedings, which resulted in an acquittal. Rachida Dati should therefore, in all likelihood, have the right to the same treatment and continue to occupy her position at the Ministry of Culture. The situation should change in the event of a conviction, but these procedures take several months, even years, before a judgment is rendered.