Transparency International France in favor of the abolition of “exceptional justice”

“There is a fairly broad agreement to move in the direction of suppression, because this jurisdiction mixes the criminal and the political and operates intermittently”estimates Patrick Lefas, president of Transparency International France, invited Thursday November 30 on franceinfo, after the acquittal of Eric Dupond-Moretti by the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR).

The conflict of interest of the Minister of Justice was “established”but not “the intentional element”, the CJR therefore decided to release Eric Dupond-Moretti on Wednesday November 29. Without commenting on this decision, Patrick Lefas nevertheless believes that the debate on the abolition of the CJR is important: “it’s about being interested in the fact that there is political responsibility on the one hand, and that there is tort and criminal responsibility on the other hand. And there is no reason that “there is, in the Republic, exceptional justice”.

This deletion is desirable because, according to him, “the top of the State must set an example to the thousands of public officials and managers, who are constantly confronted with the problem of conflict of interest. There are mayors who find themselves, as such, before ordinary courts “So exemplarity is an essential element in dealing with conflicts of interest, because where there is a conflict of interests, there is a risk of calling into question the impartiality of the public decision.”

Transparency International proposes two avenues of reflection, the designation of the Paris Court of Appeal as the sole jurisdiction for all of France to handle these cases, and the appointment of a “government ethics officer, who would come and exercise his ability to advise the minister concerned and tell him to step aside if there is a risk of conflict of interest on this or that decision”.