“These attacks strengthen me”
Christian Estrosi, mayor of Nice since 2008, president of the metropolis since 2012 and already a candidate for his re -election to the municipal elections of 2026, obviously denounced a political instrumentalization of justice by his opponents. A defense which has become as classic as the photo on the Promenade des Anglais for passing tourists. “”These attacks strengthen me “he immediately declared in Nice-Matin. He claims to have acted only in the general interest of the city and the Niçois, never for personal or family interests. His lawyer, Mathias Chichportich, assures that Christian Estrosi answered all the questions of the investigators and recalled that a complaint in slanderous denunciation was filed against some of his opponents.
Laura Tenoudji-Estrosi, for her part, told Mediapart that she was not remunerated for the junior Eurovision beyond her columnist’s salary. “”Instead of ensuring my chronicles in Télématin, I was relocated for the Junior Eurovision. The question of the conflict of interest therefore does not arise“, She explains. For the Junior Eurovision, the community has in any case aid of 605,000 euros.
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“The illegal takeover is no doubt”
On the opposition side, the tone is quite different. Jean-Christophe Picard, ecologist municipal councilor originally the report on the prosecution concerning the Nice Climate Summit, is categorical: “The illegal taking of interest is no doubt “, he assured Parisian. He specifies that Laura Tenoudji-Estrosi was to animate two debates of the environmental conference, before giving up in front of the controversy, while ensuring that she was a volunteer.
Regarding the Junior Eurovision, Jean-Christophe Picard Ironize: “We are told that Laura Tenoudji-Estrosi was taken for her skills, or everyone saw that she was not bilingual … “ He refers to the videos where we see the columnist laboriously reading a text in English and being mistaken about the nationality of children -Géorgiens and not Irish – waving the flag of their country by his side.
France Télévisions, for its part, confirmed the summons of its president Delphine Ernotte-Cuni as well as employees of the group and a subsidiary, while ensuring her full collaboration in the survey. A subsidiary of France Télévisions was searched last April as part of this affair (just as the town hall of Nice had been twice).
In Nice, the climate is deemed gentle, but it seems decidedly conducive to great events as well as to legal affairs. It remains to be seen whether, in two months, the prosecutor will consider that the light was made on these dangerous links between local power, private life and public funds.
