At first, the court barely concealed an amused smile as it listened to the old man expound, with strong imperfections of the subjunctive, about the Constitutional Council, the separation of powers and the court’s incompetence to judge the case of the National Front (FN) assistants. of the European Parliament. Bruno Gollnisch, 74, former number two in the party, professor of Japanology and former dean of the very right-wing Lyon-III faculty, was questioned about the rather questionable contracts of his assistants. He is accused of having stolen 1.41 million European funds between 2005 and 2015, for three people who actually worked for the FN.
An hour later, on Tuesday, October 8, President Bénédicte de Perthuis showed some signs of impatience but, for the first time in audience, Professor Gollnisch did not want to give up so quickly and answered the questions with real liveliness of spirit. After four hours, the president asked him to sit down again. We would easily feel sorry for his lawyer, Mᵉ Nicolay Fakiroff, if he did not in turn ask endless questions that only end up throwing an extra shovelful of coal onto the accused’s speeding verbal locomotive.
The president got angry the next day. “What do you want to say that you haven’t already said?” » “Many things, Madam President”Bruno Gollnisch responds cloyingly. “You always explain the same things, cut Mme of Perthuis, We do not want generalities, we cannot speak vaguely. » “Madam President, I am going to be remarkably specific. Some elements about the procedure before the Court of Justice of the European Union…” “This is not the question we asked you, The president is frankly annoying. We can’t waste time listening to you repeat the same things. Otherwise, we stop. Sit for five minutes. » “If they interrupt me all the time when I present evidence…”grumbles the old man.
“I don’t know why they changed the envelopes.”
The three former assistants of the MEP had a more classic defense, unfortunately not much more effective. Micheline Bruna, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s private secretary, paid by Strasbourg and supposedly Bruno Gollnisch’s parliamentary assistant, agreed that she keeps the parliamentarians’ envelope tables updated and that a new part-time assistant has joined here, a few days there, just to cover the budget kindly offered by Parliament. “It was you who centralized the budget allocations of the deputies”confirms the prosecution. “Jean-Marie Le Pen told me: “So-and-so will bypass such-and-such a deputy”, I made the arrangements”, admit mme Bruna. “But was it for budgetary reasons? » “Ah, I don’t know why they changed the envelopes. she responds, all confused by the evidence. I had no power to make decisions…”
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