Francois Fillon: ‘Clean’ image spoiled but still in race

PARIS, France – French right-wing presidential candidate Francois Fillon is a career politician whose image as a scandal-free leader has been severely tarnished during the campaign.

As he sought the nomination for the rightwing Republicans party last year, Fillon talked up his reputation as “Mr Clean” – in contrast to his party rivals, former president Nicolas Sarkozy and ex-PM Alain Juppe.

Prospective presidents needed to be “irreproachable,” he said, while ministers facing charges could not serve in his government “while being dogged by suspicion.”  

In late January, he said in an national TV interview that “there is only one thing that would stop me being a candidate: if my honor was called into question, if I was charged.”

That is now a reality as the 63-year-old was charged last week with misuse of public money and corporate assets over the employment of his wife as a parliamentary assistant for 15 years.

Though an MP employing a family member is not illegal in France, Penelope Fillon is accused of doing little for the 680,000 euros ($725,000) she received in salary. 

The ex-prime minister  has denied all wrongdoing but has backtracked on his promise to withdraw his candidacy and is now running as an anti-system rebel determined to thwart the media, the government and magistrates who he says are working against him.

Lost credibility

However his legal problems worsened on Tuesday, March 21, when judicial sources said that financial prosecutors have expanded the probe to one of “aggravated fraud, forgery and use of forgeries”.

The widened probe includes documents signed by Penelope Fillon bearing differing calculations of hours worked, the daily Le Monde reported.

Fillon was also hit by potentially even more embarrassing revelations when the Canard Enchaine newspaper reported that he had introduced a Lebanese oil pipeline builder – with whom he signed a $50,000 lobbying contract – to Russian President Vladimir Putin at a business forum in St. Petersburg in 2015.

His campaign team insisted that “suspicions of conflict of interest are totally unfounded”.

The scandal has cost him credibility and support among his party and the electorate.

After being the clear frontrunner at the beginning of the year, polls currently suggest he will be eliminated in the first round of the election on April 23.

Other commentators wonder whether Fillon has lost the moral authority to carry out his key campaign pledge – to slash public spending by cutting the jobs of half a million civil servants.

Imposing manor house

Fillon and his wife, who comes from Wales, met at university in France when they were in their early twenties.

They soon married and live in an imposing manor house near Le Mans in northern France where they brought up their 5 children.

She was until recently a low-key political wife, a keen horse-rider who once described herself as a country “peasant” who preferred the countryside to Paris.

In examining Fillon’s claims that his wife has “always” worked to help his career, the French media have honed in on previous comments she made.

“Until now, I have never got involved in my husband’s political life,” Penelope told regional newspaper Le Bien Public last year, echoing a similar statement to Britain’s Sunday Telegraph newspaper in 2007.

‘Mr Nobody’

After 5 years as prime minister under President Sarkozy from 2007-2012, Fillon emerged from his shadow during the campaign to become the Republicans party’s presidential candidate.

The long-time outsider accelerated past Sarkozy and former prime minister Juppe in the final weeks of the contest, giving assured performances in a series of debates and opening up about his family.

In a widely watched television series, Fillon laughed about his “boring image” and talked about his passion for mountains, racing cars and drones.

He won the rightwing nomination pledging radical economic reform for a country he said was “on the verge of revolt” after decades of chronic overspending, mass unemployment and a series of terror attacks since 2015.

Supporters also cheered his hardline stance on immigration.

He raised eyebrows when he told immigrants “when you enter someone else’s house, you do not take over.”

His outspokenness stood in contrast to his image as premier, of a quiet and urbane man whose steady temperament contrasted with the impulsive Sarkozy.

Sarkozy once dismissed him as “Mr Nobody”.

Once the youngest member of parliament at age 27, Fillon is a devout Catholic who voted against gay marriage when it was legalized in 2013. 

The self-declared “Gaullist” – a form of nationalism that proposes an independent and strong France – also has a close bond with Russian President Putin.

The two men overlapped as prime ministers from 2008-2012 and their closeness has led to questions about his foreign policy as well as the Canard Enchaine‘s lobby allegation. – Adam Plowright, Agence France-Presse | Rappler.com

Top photo: Francois Fillon poses for a photo session in Paris on November 25, 2016. Joel Saget/AFP