Fears of a constitutional crisis in France grew yesterday when an investigation into an alleged 4.5 million francs (£5 million) defence contract fraud threatened the presidency of the Constitutional Council, a supreme court which rules on disputes between the Gaullist President, Mr Jacques Chirac, and the Socialist Prime Minister, Mr Lionel Jospin.
Examining magistrates have seized documents from the private and official offices of the council's chairman, Mr Roland Dumas (75), a former Socialist foreign minister, during an inquiry into alleged backhanders involving the state oil group Elf-Aquitaine. He is under pressure to resign after the affair was linked to a close woman friend and business associate, Ms Christine Deviers-Joncour.
Mr Dumas has denied links with the judicial investigation which led to Ms Deviers-Joncour being placed in custody in November 1997 as part of an inquiry into Elf-Aquitaine. Before joining Mr Dumas's private staff when he was foreign minister, she worked with Elf's deputy chairman, Mr Alfred Sirven, who has absconded after being suspected of involvement in fraud.
If Mr Dumas goes, Mr Chirac could appoint his own nominee to block Socialist legislation such as the 35-hour week and give him an advantage in the tense "cohabitation" administration. Mr Dumas, a barrister, has told council members that the Presidency wanted his head, but he would fight back.
Yesterday two examining magistrates sorted through piles of documents seized in fraud squad raids. Some were found in Mr Dumas's luxurious suite at the Constitutional Council at the Palais Royal. Members considered whether to ask him to stand down while examining magistrates decided whether he was aware of an alleged fraud over a defence contract while foreign minister.
The council's secretary-general, Mr Jean-Eric Schoettl, has complained that the fraud inquiry has already delayed important council decisions because Mr Dumas, foreign minister between 1984 and 1993, could not attend meetings.
Ms Eva Joly, one of the examining magistrates who led the raids on Mr Dumas's offices, had been inquiring into Elf's suspect international dealings when she allegedly uncovered a network of underhand payments. While looking into the sale of six frigates to Taiwan for £1.5 billion, Ms Joly was told by the arms contractor, Thomson, that it suspected that additional bills of £16 million, which it refused to pay, were illegal backhanders to go-betweens recommended by Elf.
Like other French newspapers, Le Monde yesterday gave details of payments ranging from £25,000 to £80,000 paid by a woman into an account under Mr Dumas's name. Officials at the examining magistrate's office said an attempt was being made to link the payments with diplomatic advice to Mr Mitterrand to ignore Chinese protests over the Taiwan deal.
The provincial daily Nice-Matin said yesterday that the case was "at the confluence of money, women and power" while the centre-left daily Liberation spoke of the "bizarre relations" between "the powers-that-be and the judiciary" which had their parallel in the bizarre relations between the government and state-owned industry like the recently-privatised Elf.