Historical figure of the French extreme right, Jean-Marie Le Pen, 95, was placed “under legal protection regime”, a form of guardianship, for medical reasons, said Wednesday the vice-president of the National Rally (RN ) Louis Aliot.
The former president of the National Front (from which the RN comes) was the subject of a future protection warrant in mid-February, his lawyer, Me François Wagner, told AFP, confirming information from the radio RMC. This civil provision, comparable to guardianship, was activated at the request of the family by the local court of Puteaux, in the Paris region, following a medical assessment establishing the incapacity of Jean-Marie Le Pen.
She made her three daughters – Marie-Caroline, Yann and Marine Le Pen – her agents, allowing them to carry out various acts in their father’s name, alone or in concert. Three times unsuccessful candidate in the presidential election, Marine Le Pen is today the leader of the RN, which has become the leading French opposition party.
Jean-Marie Le Pen chaired the National Front from 1972 to 2011, managing to unite various families of the French extreme right, from supporters of French Algeria to those nostalgic for the regime of Marshal Pétain during the Second World War.
A tribune whose verbal slippages have earned him multiple trials for racism or anti-Semitism, he managed to rise to everyone’s surprise in the second round of the 2002 presidential election, ultimately won by the Gaullist Jacques Chirac. According to several of those close to him, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s health has declined significantly since a heart attack in April 2023.
The question of his ability to appear at his trial scheduled for the fall in a case involving assistants to MEPs who were allegedly employed on national tasks in contravention of the rules of the European Parliament, has now been raised. “I think that the court will have to pronounce a measure stating that he cannot surrender, nor testify, nor participate in this trial,” considered Louis Aliot, while a decision must be rendered at the beginning of July.
