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France's Fillon says would launch probe into Hollande if elected

04 April 2017 00:05 (UTC +04:00)

French presidential candidate Francois Fillon, an outsider to win after involvement in a financial scandal, said on Monday he would order a parliamentary inquiry into allegations President Francois Hollande interfered in the justice system, if elected, APA reports quoting Reuters.

Once the frontrunner, the conservative former prime minister's poll ratings have slumped since allegations surfaced that he paid his wife, a son and a daughter hundreds of thousands of euros of public money for minimal work.

Fillon, 63, who is being investigated by magistrates over the jobs allegations and over a gift of expensive suits, insisted on his innocence.

"If I had the slightest doubt about my guilt I wouldn't be a candidate in the presidential election," he told BFM TV.

He said he was the victim of "manipulation", but drew back from previous allegations that Hollande, a Socialist president who is not standing for a second term, had personally led a smear campaign against him. He said he could not prove this.

He said however that prosecutors should open an inquiry into allegations made in a book by two journalists from satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaine that Hollande had judicial wiretaps that interested him sent to his office.

"Prosecutors should take up this case. If they don't do so and if I am elected president, there will be a parliamentary commission of inquiry," Fillon said.

Hollande's office has rejected Fillon's accusations and denied interference in the justice system.