Mayor Gaël Perdriau definitively excluded from the Les Républicains party

Gaël Perdriau is definitively excluded from the Les Républicains party, reports Tuesday, October 11, France Bleu Saint-Etienne Loire. A decision which comes a little over a month after the revelations of Mediapart on an intimate video blackmail for which the mayor of Saint-Etienne is implicated. The elected official is accused of having blackmailed the former first deputy to the City, Gilles Artigues. The latter filed a complaint for “aggravated blackmail, ambush in an organized gang, embezzlement of public funds and non-denunciation of criminal acts”.

The party had launched the procedure for the exclusion of the mayor on September 13th. Moreover, since the revelation of this case, several calls for resignation have been launched. Elected officials – from left and right – from the metropolis of Saint-Etienne have signed a petition in direction. The economic world of the Loire published a press release on September 15, in which it recalls its “expectation of strong ethics on the part of local political leaders in whom the confidence of citizens has been placed” and to “strongly challenge the elected officials of Saint-Étienne Métropole and the City of Saint-Étienne on the necessity and urgency to take the necessary measures so that Governance regains serenity, teamwork and exemplarity within local institutions”.

Faced with the scandal, Gaël Perdriau dismissed his chief of staff and renounced his representative functions in the city and the Metropolis. One of his assistants, namely accused of having shot a compromising video, has submitted his resignation. During a City Council on September 26, the mayor of Saint-Etienne proclaimed his innocence. “It is not because we are accused that we are guilty”, did he declare. He denounced a “political and media lynching”.