Since the end of March, several investigations have revealed gray areas on the use of the subsidies allocated to this fund against separatism created in 2021.
They want to shed light on accusations “very serious”. The deputies of the National Rally asked, Thursday, April 13, the creation of a parliamentary commission of inquiry on the Marianne fund. This initiative comes after a series of revelations about the controversial use of grants allocated to this fund against separatism, created after the assassination of teacher Samuel Paty.
Marine Le Pen’s group in the National Assembly cites in particular a joint investigation by the weekly Marianne and France 2 broadcast at the end of March, describing an opaque management of this fund launched in 2021 by Marlène Schiappa, then Minister Delegate for Citizenship. According to the investigation, the association which would be the main beneficiary, the Union of Physical Education and Military Preparation Societies (USEPPM), would have used it for a website and publications on social networks very little followed, and to pay two of its ex-leaders.
The RN also refers to more recent revelations from Mediapart, according to which “another structure received more than 300,000 euros when it had just been created and had no known activity”. “Under cover of the fight against separatism”this association would have, according to Mediapart, “disseminated political content against opponents of Emmanuel Macron during the presidential and legislative campaigns”.
The RN questions “the role of Marlène Schiappa”
“These accusations are extremely serious and raise questions about the role of Marlène Schiappa in this case when she claimed in June 2022 to have personally validated, with her cabinet, the choice of beneficiaries and the breakdown of subsidies”, estimated the RN group on Thursday. A motion for a resolution “aiming at the creation of a parliamentary commission of inquiry” on the management of the fund was tabled by the members of the group. A vote of the Assembly will be necessary for it to be launched.
“Talking about embezzlement or campaign financing is false and misleading”, reacted the cabinet of Marlène Schiappa. The Secretary of State for Citizenship had indicated, at the end of March, that it had seized the General Inspectorate of Administration for an audit on the question. This referral “will make it possible to shed full light and to determine in complete transparency the conditions of operation and allocation of these subsidies”according to the firm.
Several voices have already been raised on the left asking to shed light on this affair, including the mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo (PS) and the leader of the LFI deputies, Mathilde Panot. The Paris prosecutor’s office has indicated that a report on this file is being analyzed, before a decision on a possible opening of an investigation.
Part of the family of Samuel Paty, professor of history and geography beheaded on October 16, 2020 by a radicalized Islamist, said at the beginning of April “particularly shocked” after the publication of the first surveys on this fund.