Former French president Jacques Chirac is likely to be questioned in the coming months over a corruption scandal involving fake jobs created to help fund a conservative political party he headed, his lawyer said today.
Thescandal is the most potent of a string of potential legal problems Mr Chirac (74) faces now that he no longer has presidential immunity. He handed over the French presidency to Nicolas Sarkozy on May 16th.
Chirac is expected to face questioning over a corruption scandal
The jobs case dates back to Mr Chirac's years as mayor of Paris, from 1977 to 1995, when he also headed the conservative party Rally for the Republic (RPR).
Investigators say operatives from the RPR were illegally on the Paris city payroll in a scheme to help finance the party, and that the equivalent of millions of euros in salaries and fees were doled out.
The RPR party was later replaced by the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), which now dominates parliament and Mr Sarkozy's government.
Mr Chirac will "very probably" be questioned before September 15th as a material witness in the case, lawyer Jean Veil said.
Under French law, a material witness falls between a simple witness and a suspect. The material witness is not formally under an investigation and has the right to a lawyer during questioning but can later face charges if investigating magistrates find "serious or concordant signs" of an infraction or a crime.
Mr Veil stressed today that Mr Chirac has given an "absolutely definitive" refusal to being questioned in two other cases - the so-called Clearstream affair involving a smear campaign against Mr Sarkozy and the alleged killing of a French judge in Djibouti in 1995.
Mr Chirac's office said last week that because he had constitutionally guaranteed judicial immunity while he was president, he cannot be ordered to provide testimony about incidents that happened during his tenure.
PA