Emannuel Macron, aka Jupiter; Alexandre Benalla with Macron. Photo supplied
Will the Benalla Affair sink the French president?
One of Emmanuel Macron’s leading aides has been caught impersonating riot police to assault protesters. The scandal known in France as the Benalla Affair has exploded over the last week. Some are calling it a French Watergate.
Published: July 24, 2018, 9:32 am
Christian Jacob, group leader of Les Républicains, the mainstream centrist party in France, raised some alarming questions in an interview with Valeurs Actuelle. “Under Jupiter [Macron’s nickname] there are privileges and there is ‘unhealthy cronyism’, as the the Paris police prefect Michel Delpuech put it during his hearing,” Jacob noted.
“On what basis can a 26-year-old man, a ‘nightclub bouncer’, without skills, without experience and without having the status, be responsible for handling presidential protection for a country that is the fifth global power?”
Alexandre Benalla, a Moroccan, owns a lavish home on Quai Branly in Paris, a car with a chauffeur and a flashing light, a fabulous salary, a gun, a police armband… and accreditation to the National Assembly, a very select precinct to which even the President of the Republic does not have access.
French media reported that Benalla has some extremely high privileges. Not only does he receive a monthly wage of €10,000, but also had a government vehicle and lodgings paid for by the state. Hinting at previously unknown proximity with the presidential couple, he was also reported to possess keys to their home in Le Touquet, in northern France, where Macron and his wife, Brigitte, often retreat.
“Does this individual, who is at the president’s side daily, have some means of pressuring the president? Faced with so many privileges, we have the right to ask this question,” Jacob said.
In one incident involving Benalla, “riot police” pushed a peaceful protester to the ground before assaulting him. It now turns out not all of them were policemen.
According to French daily Le Monde, one of the men beating the protester was, in fact, the top-ranking security advisor to Emmanuel Macron, dressed in riot gear.
Shortly after officials from the Elysée Palace were alerted to the incident, the twenty-six-year-old security guard, was suspended for fifteen days. Crucially, presidential officials did not notify prosecutors. French law requires of public employees if they witness colleagues committing a crime to report it.
After serving his brief suspension, Benalla was allowed to return to his duties and joined Macron for a ceremony at the Pantheon on July 1. He was also with the president during the Bastille Day festivities two week later.
He even joined France’s national football team for its World Cup victory parade down the Champs-Elysées. He now faces possible charges of “violence committed by a public official” and of impersonating law enforcement officers.
The scandal ballooned after Benalla allegedly contacted a top-level Parisian police official and requested visual material of him beating a protester to be confiscated. Three police officials complied with the request, one of them the commander in charge of the liaison between police and the Elysée. All three have since been suspended and taken into custody for questioning.
Initially, the presidential palace tried to defend Benalla, but on Friday the dam wall broke.
Interior Minister Gérard Collomb will appear before a special investigative committee because he knew of Benalla’s transgressions on May 2.
Why was Benalla, a young security guard with no police background, given such extraordinary authority by the Elysée? It betrays an arrogance and sense of infallibility by the former investment banker Macron, who has not commented on the affair yet.
According to French online publication Brut, Benalla was supected of a hit-and-run incident several years ago. He had worked for the Socialist Party before joining Macron’s side. He has strangely not yet been charged of any wrongdoing.
The Elysée has its own special security force, known as the Security Group of the President of the Republic, similar to the US Secret Service. Benalla, however, was never a part of this team, but rather serving the president in the a vaguely termed position of “assistant to the chief of staff” and moreover spared the consequences of his questionable actions.
Less than two months ago, on June 6, French social media reported that Makao, another individual who served as Macron’s bodyguard during the presidential campaign, was caught on a Snapchat video playing video games with Jawad Bendaoud, a convicted criminal and landlord of the ISIS terrorists that staged the brutal November 2015 Paris gun and bomb attacks that left 137 people dead.
All rights reserved. You have permission to quote freely from the articles provided that the source (www.freewestmedia.com) is given. Photos may not be used without our consent.
Consider donating to support our work
Help us to produce more articles like this. FreeWestMedia is depending on donations from our readers to keep going. With your help, we expose the mainstream fake news agenda.
Keep your language polite. Readers from many different countries visit and contribute to Free West Media and we must therefore obey the rules in, for example, Germany. Illegal content will be deleted.
If you have been approved to post comments without preview from FWM, you are responsible for violations of any law. This means that FWM may be forced to cooperate with authorities in a possible crime investigation.
If your comments are subject to preview by FWM, please be patient. We continually review comments but depending on the time of day it can take up to several hours before your comment is reviewed.
We reserve the right to delete comments that are offensive, contain slander or foul language, or are irrelevant to the discussion.
Europe
New App Helps Locate Sweden’s Historic Runestones
A new app called Swedish Runestones will help locate historical gems.
Swedish military wants to remilitarize the Åland Islands
The demilitarized autonomy has previously been known as 'the islands of peace.
NOAA Predicts Zero Sunspots for Almost the Whole 2030s
CLIMATEThe United States' government scientific organization, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), predicts zero sunspots from 2031 to 2040. This is an extreme situation that has not occurred in as long as humanity has been counting sunspots, and it leads us into uncharted territory in terms of our solar system. However, this prediction aligns with the warnings of the world-renowned solar researcher Valentina Zharkova for many years, who indicated in 2019 various signs of this catastrophic phenomenon, including the extreme hailstorms we have seen in Europe and the world this summer. The forecast and various observations this year give cause for very significant concern. In this unique analysis, Free West Media explains why.
European Nationalist Parties Forge Cooperation Ahead of EU Elections
EUROPEAN ELECTIONSOn Saturday, August 26, representatives of six European nationalist parties gathered in Budapest. The meeting was initiated by the Hungarian party Mi Hazánk and took place in the national parliament. Representatives of the parties signed a joint declaration that not only reaffirms the parties' friendship but also their unity on a range of complex political issues. A surprisingly clear and radical manifesto was established. The hope is that this cooperation will lead to success in the EU elections and eventually result in the formation of a group in the European Parliament. For Swedish nationalism, this meeting marks a success as Sweden, for the first time, has a party represented in a leading nationalist cooperation in Europe. Free West Media was present at this historic event.
Turkey Believes Sweden Hasn’t Done Enough
Sweden will have to wait a bit longer for NATO membership, according to Turkey's Justice Minister Jilmaz Tunc. First, Sweden must extradite the "terrorists" Turkey wants and stop the desecration of the Quran.
Swedish Weapon Takes Down Russia’s Best Attack Helicopter
The Russian attack helicopter Ka-52 is considered one of the world's best and has struck fear in Ukraine, where it has hunted down tanks and other armored vehicles, often beyond the range of many light anti-aircraft systems. However, it has met its match in the Swedish air defense missile system RBS 70, which has quickly led to significant losses for the Russian helicopter forces.
The Sun Drives Earth’s Climate, Not Carbon Dioxide
Top Researchers Push Back Against Climate Lies."The correlation is as clear as day," explained the Israeli astrophysicist Nir Shaviv, who was hailed by the establishment, before his interview with Forbes was hastily deleted. What he says contradicts the climate narrative, which points to humans as responsible for Earth's climate. Shaviv firmly asserts that it is the sun that controls the climate, something that can be scientifically proven in many ways. Contrary to the popular belief, the sun's influence on Earth has, in recent years, caused unusually cold and rainy weather, a trend that solar researchers warn will worsen significantly in the coming decades. The sun has exhibited an unusually low activity since 2016, during Solar Cycle 24, which was the weakest in a century.
Strong Confidence in German AfD
Alternative for Germany (AfD) held a party conference on July 29-30 to select candidates for the upcoming EU election next year. EU Parliament member Maximilian Krah, belonging to the party's more radical, ethnonationalist faction, was appointed as the top candidate. The party's two spokespersons delivered powerful speeches criticizing the EU's failed migration policy and trade sanctions that isolate Europe and Germany from the rest of the world. They argued that it's time for the EU to return a significant portion of its power to national parliaments. However, they have dropped the demand for Germany to exit the EU.
The Establishment Wants to Ban Germany’s Second Largest Party – for the Sake of Democracy
The rising popularity of AfD has raised strong concerns within the establishment. Despite lies and demonization in the media and isolation from the overall political establishment, the party continues to grow. Certain representatives of the party are accused of becoming increasingly "extreme," and in an unusual move, the influential weekly newspaper Der Spiegel demanded that AfD be "banned."
Dutch FvD break through the media blockade
What is happening in the Netherlands? It is often difficult to follow events in other countries, especially when distorted by system media. We give Forum for Democracy (FvD) the opportunity to speak out on the political situation in the Netherlands and the staunch resistance they face in trying to save the country.
No comments.
By submitting a comment you grant Free West Media a perpetual license to reproduce your words and name/web site in attribution. Inappropriate and irrelevant comments will be removed at an admin’s discretion. Your email is used for verification purposes only, it will never be shared.