Emmanuel Macron's top aide is charged with conflict of interest

French President Emmanuel Macron’s top aide is charged with conflict of interest after ‘failing to disclose links to a shipping giant’ in corruption probe

  • Alexis Kohler was indicted over his alleged links with shipping company MSC
  • Kohler, Macron’s adviser sits at top of the Elysee Palace’s administrative pyramid
  • Kohler ‘categorically denied any wrongdoing’ over personal links with company

French President Emmanuel Macron’s chief of staff has been charged with a conflict of interest, the chief financial crimes prosecutor said Monday.

Alexis Kohler, Macron’s closest and most influential adviser, was indicted by the national financial crimes prosecutor over a conflict of interest relating to his alleged links with Swiss-Italian shipping company Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), the prosecutor’s office said.

Kohler sits at the top of the Elysee Palace’s administrative pyramid, and news of his indictment – a legal step that puts him under formal investigation in France – is a blow.

The move also came hours after another Macron ally, Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti, was ordered to stand trial in a separate case, also over a conflict of interest. 

Alexis Kohler, Macron’s closest and most influential adviser, was indicted by the national financial crimes prosecutor over a conflict of interest

Kohler is accused over his professional and family links with Italian-Swiss shipping company MSC which is run by his mother’s cousins, prosecutor Jean-Francois Bohnert said in a statement.

MSC, which runs cruise ships, is one of the biggest clients of French shipyard Chantiers de l’Atlantique, the maker of the Queen Mary 2, which the French government has tried to restructure several times over the past decades. 

On Monday, Kohler ‘categorically denied any wrongdoing’, his lawyer said, while an official in Macron’s office said Kohler remained in his post.

In 2018, Anticor, an anti-corruption NGO, filed a legal complaint against Kohler for illegal influence-peddling concerning contracts awarded to MSC in 2010 and 2011.

Kohler allegedly failed to reveal his family connections with MSC to the French agency for public investment where he worked at the time.

The case was dismissed the following year, but in 2020, Anticor filed a civil case which usually triggers a probe by an investigating magistrate.

Kohler, whose office at the Elysee is located next to that of the president, is often described as Macron’s right-hand man.

His job involves handling emergencies, major economic and social issues as well as some political decisions.

Kohler is accused over his professional and family links with Italian-Swiss shipping company MSC which is run by his mother’s cousins, prosecutor Jean-Francois Bohnert said in a statement

His lawyer, Eric Dezeuze, said the discovery of evidence linked to the charging would allow Kohler ‘to prove his innocence’.

But Anticor lawyer Jean-Baptiste Soufron said ‘the question of his resignation is now on the table’.

The prosecutor’s office confirmed ‘Alexis Kohler, currently the Secretary-General of the French presidency, has been put under formal investigation for unlawful taking of interest,’ it said in a statement.

Macron’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Le Figaro newspaper said Macron had decided to keep Kohler in the job despite the investigation.

Macron’s office has said before that Kohler had at no time hidden his family ties to the Aponte family that founded and still owns MSC.

The complaint alleges a conflict of interest based on Kohler’s dealings with MSC while he was working for the French state holdings agency between 2012-2014 and later as a senior official in Macron’s team at the finance ministry in 2014-2016.

Kohler left the finance ministry in 2016 when Macron stepped down as economy minister. He then moved to Geneva to take up a position on MSC’s board. Nine months later, Kohler quit that post to join the Elysee following Macron’s election in 2017.

Under French law, a formal investigation means there is evidence implicating a suspect, but does not mean the person being investigated has been charged.

The person can be charged at a later date if further evidence emerges against them, or the investigation can be dropped.   

Adding to pressure on Macron’s administration, Justice Minister Dupond-Moretti was ordered Monday to stand trial, charged with misusing his position to settle scores with opponents from his legal career.

The former star lawyer is the first sitting French justice minister to be charged in a legal probe.

The accusations relate to administrative inquiries ordered into three judges during Dupond-Moretti’s time as minister, which were denounced by critics as a witchhunt.

The three judges had ordered police in 2014 to pore through the phone records of dozens of lawyers and magistrates, including Dupond-Moretti, as part of an investigation into former president Nicolas Sarkozy.

The order to stand trial was issued by the investigation commission of the Law Court of the Republic in Paris, which hears cases of alleged wrongdoing by serving ministers.

But his lawyers, Christophe Ingrain and Remi Lorrain, said they had already appealed, sparking a temporary suspension of the move.

Lorrain said France’s highest appeals court would now pursue the matter.

A source close to the case said it was uncertain when the appeals court would rule on the matter.

Lorrain said there had been ‘many irregularities’ in the case, and the chief prosecutor, Francois Molins, had been ‘unfair and biased’.

The case against Dupond-Moretti goes back to January 2021 when Anticor and a magistrates’ union filed a legal complaint, accusing him of using his ministerial powers to take revenge on his enemies in the judiciary.

He was charged the following July.

Despite opposition calls for him to be sacked, Macron re-appointed him as justice minister in a cabinet reshuffle earlier this year.

France’s two main magistrates’ unions said the accusations put Dupond-Moretti in an ‘unprecedented’ position.

In a statement they said there could be ‘another conflict of interest’ when Dupond-Moretti, as justice minister, picks a successor to prosecutor Molins who is to retire in June.

‘He would get to appoint his own accuser,’ the unions said.

Anti-corruption NGO Transparency International called for Dupond-Moretti’s resignation.

Contacted by AFP, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne’s office declined to comment on whether Dupond-Moretti’s job was at risk.

A spokesperson for the prime minister noted simply that ‘the procedure is ongoing’ and that it was organised so as not to affect Dupond-Moretti’s business as justice minister.

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