Jacques Chirac convicted

In a first for France, on 15 December Jacques Chirac was given a suspended sentence of two years for "breach of trust, misappropriation of public funds, and taking illegal advantage" — charges that are spelled out in large type over a portrait of the former French President on the front page ofLibération. The case concerned fake jobs at Paris city hall, which generated funds for the financing of the RPR, the former party of Chirac who was the mayor of the French capital at the time.

Aged 79 and suffering from neurological disorders, Chirac has decided not to appeal. ForLibération, the verdict delivered in the wake of legal proceedings that lasted 16 years raises the issue of the legal status of heads of state and their immunity to prosecution while in office:

That is not to say that it is reasonable for the president to be subject to trial in the same way as other citizens. But between this nonsensical idea and the quasi-immunity that Jacques Chirac enjoyed for almost 20 years, there is room for improvement. Doubtless the best legal and constitutional experts could devise another legal status for the head of state — in fact they already have — which would lay to rest questions about the influence of this institutional curiosity on the course of democracy.

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On the same wavelength, rival daily Le Monde argues that

if this symbolic conviction is a credit to justice and democracy, it should encourage politicians to raise the issue of total immunity of the president in the run-up to the presidential elections, which are to held four months from now. […] As the statutory guarantor of justice, the president cannot be attacked in court, but at the same time, like his fellow citizens who are subject to trial, he can choose to sue whomever he chooses, as Mr Sarkozy has done […]. There is an anomaly here that should be corrected.