Criticism of unexpectedly hard punishment for French ex-presidents
© What/AFP
The unexpectedly hard punishment for the French ex-president in the affair about illegal campaign financing from Libya has triggered violent reactions in France. Sarkozy’s former advisor Henri Guaino asked President Emmanuel Macron on Friday that Sarkozy at least partially pardoned. The non -sliding prison sentence is a “humiliation of Sarkozy and the state institutions,” he told RTL.
The right -wing populist Marine Le Pen, who, like Sarkozy, was sentenced to an immediate effect, once more accused the French judiciary to conduct political processes. “Some judges have a kind of shooting list and want to meet as many politicians as possible,” she told LCI. The financial prosecutor had become a “political prosecutor”.
Solidarity for Sarkozy from right -wing conservative camp
In the right -wing conservative camp, several politicians Sarkozy expressed their solidarity, including Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau. He hoped that Sarkozy could “prove his innocence” in the appeal process, he said. The conservative newspaper “Le Figaro” spoke of an “earthquake” and called the judgment “absurd and incomprehensible”.
Left -wing politicians, on the other hand, were mocking. “You have enough of the crook pack? We will eliminate it,” commented the left -wing populist MEP Manon Aubry, quoting a famous remark of Sarkozy on the situation in the suburbs he wanted to “clean with the Kärcher” as the interior minister.
MP Benjamin Lucas-Lundy said with a view to the five-year prison sentence, which corresponds to the time of his presidency: “Now he finally gets his second term”.
Appointment procedure possible
The previous day, the court had decided in a sensational judgment that Sarkozy was guilty of participating in a criminal association and had to go to prison for five years. He will experience the beginning of his detention on October 13th. This could not be postponed by an appeal procedure.
