Former Mr. Retraites Jean-Paul Delevoye condemned for "forgetting" his declaration of interests

This is one of the cases that shook the five-year term of Emmanuel Macron.

After the sensational resignation of Jean-Paul Delevoye on December 16, 2019, resulting in his withdrawal from the government and the political landscape, the time has come for his judicial conviction.

At the end of a hearing held Thursday, December 2 in the afternoon in all discretion at the Paris Criminal Court, the former High Commissioner for Pensions was sentenced to four months in prison and 15,000 euros. fine.

There is no penalty of ineligibility against him or registration in his criminal record.

From the outset, the former Chiraquian who became the president's man of confidence and one of the pillars of Macronie, responsible for securing the mother of all reforms, chose the "plead guilty".

In other words, in judicial jargon, an appearance on prior acknowledgment of guilt (CRPC), which at the end of a simplified procedure, leads the public prosecutor to propose a sentence lower than that incurred, in exchange for the recognition of his guilt .

"It was a hearing in which Mr. Delevoye was able to say that he assumed his responsibility for the facts with which he was accused", declared his lawyer, Me Marion Delaigue to AFP.

"Both the president of the court and the prosecutor recognized the good faith of Mr. Delevoye, who did not seek to evade or to defraud", she underlined.

The Paris prosecutor's office opened a preliminary investigation in December 2019 for “breach of trust”, “abuse of corporate assets” and concealment of these offenses, after being seized by the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life (HATVP).

She had reported her incomplete declaration of interests and, in particular, a possible "concealment of abuse of social good" for having accumulated his government remuneration with that of president of the think tank Parallaxe.

A resignation seven days after the first revelations

The soap opera lasted a week at the start of winter 2019: cascading revelations, the first in our columns, on the famous "oversights" of Jean-Paul Delevoye to the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life (HATVP).

An incomplete and incorrect declaration of interests, omitting a dozen mandates that he had held in recent years and underestimating some of his remuneration.

Responsible then for carrying the reform dear to Emmanuel Macron, inscribed on the pediment of the promises of the presidential campaign of 2017 ... the High Commissioner for pensions resigned in less than seven days.

A quick decision in the face of the media storm.

“My mistake is guilty lightness.

I pay her, ”he admitted at the time.

The political sanction was immediate.

"It is the hard law of responsibility, exemplarity and transparency which must apply to everyone and to me in particular",

endorsed the one in whom Emmanuel Macron had placed all his confidence, first to manage his party and his presidential campaign.

One of the mandates of Jean-Paul Delevoye among the most "troublesome" legally is his position as administrator within the Training Institute of the insurance profession between 2016 and 2019, which Le Parisien - Today in France had revealed.

An “oversight” in his declaration of interests - like his remuneration from the Parallaxe think tank - he replied to us, invoking in a telephone exchange the joint responsibility of his wife in charge of administrative stewardship ... The function is voluntary and very little involved had defended Jean-Paul Delevoye.

“An oversight” nonetheless very problematic, because it raised the issue of conflict of interest.

The insurance sector is very interested "by the prospects" opened by the pension reform, as declared at the end of October 2019, the general manager of AG2R La Mondiale, André Renaudin.

What has escaped no one.

This "negligence" is likely to constitute a violation of the law October 11, 2013 - passed after the Cahuzac affair - indicated at the time the anti-corruption association Anticor.

It is moreover this law which created the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life.

Jean-Paul Delevoye had in the wake of our revelations regularized the situation, by resigning from Ifpass on December 9, 2019, like other mandates.