It was enough for his “friends” to create an association, and for the ex-minister to hold a first meeting, to bring the political landerneau of Lot-et-Garonne to boiling point: ten years after his fall, Jérôme Cahuzac is return to the arena.
“He is at home here. People are grateful for everything he has done and we created an association to bring together his friends,” explains Monique Gruelles, former section secretary of the Socialist Party in Pujols, a neighboring town of Villeneuve-sur-Lot where Jérôme Cahuzac served as mayor from 2001 to 2012.
Rather welcoming welcome
It is with this faithful among the faithful that the association of friends of Jérôme Cahuzac took up residence at the end of September. Two weeks later, the former Minister of the Budget convicted in 2018 for tax fraud (after revelations from Mediapart in 2013) to four years in prison, two of which were suspended, and five years of ineligibility, brought together 400 people on a Friday evening in the Pujols village hall. The next morning, at age 71, he realized “a dream,” as he explained to the newspaper South West : return to the Villeneuve market.
This Thursday in Monsempron-Libos, near Fumel, he received a rather benevolent welcome, without marked hostility or major excitement, on another market in the 3rd constituency of Lot-et-Garonne, for which he was a deputy for ten years.
“He did a lot for Villeneuvois, so why not come back,” said Dany, a 73-year-old retiree. Daniel, 75, also says he is “ready to give him a second chance”. Conversely, Claude, 75, “wonders what the hell he’s doing here”. “When you have been a lying, dissembling and tax evading minister, coming here to make a return to politics shocks me,” he adds. “It’s not normal that he lied to the Assembly, that doesn’t work,” also believes Robert, 73 years old.
“I don’t think he’s doing this for nothing.”
Three or four years before the next deadlines (municipal in 2026, legislative in 2027), speculation is rife about his intentions. “It’s all a question of circumstances, for me as for anyone else,” he dodged in South West.
“I don’t think he’s doing this for nothing,” said former MP (LREM) for the 3rd constituency Olivier Damaisin. “If he showed up in Villeneuve, he would represent a danger for the current mayor, Guillaume Lepers (LR). He is Macron-compatible but he is above all Cahuzian, outside the parties,” adds the man who was beaten in 2022 by Annick Cousin (RN).
The LR councilor of Villeneuve did not wish to comment but he withdrew the delegation of an elected representative of his majority who wandered around the market alongside the cumbersome predecessor. “The chief of staff sent me an SMS five minutes later to summon me to the mayor’s office on Monday,” says Estelle Henault-Blineau (Renaissance), for whom this reaction betrays “a fear of a return” of the former socialist.
“He won’t have a party label, it’s difficult to win without…”
In Fumel, the mayor LR, Jean-Louis Costes, fumes. “With Cahuzac, indecency has no limits, true to himself and his oversized ego, he thinks that the Villeneuvois want him (…) Today Cahuzac has a right: that of being forgotten”, tackles the former deputy for the 3rd constituency, elected in 2013 during the by-election which followed the scandal.
“After being convicted of tax fraud, he will not have the label of a party, it is difficult to win without… and then he will no longer have his parliamentary reserve to establish his power”, scratches the MP from the neighboring constituency, Hélène Laporte (RN), whose grandfather was a candidate for the legislative elections in 1997 against… Jérôme Cahuzac.