“I was wrong, I apologize to the French, but I don't want to deprive my constituents of the possibility of voting for me. My program is annoying, it's the only one capable of restoring confidence in the French”: François Fillon doesn't agree, he replies harshly to the accusations about the alleged fictitious hiring of his wife as a collaborator and does not intend to give up an inch on his candidacy in the presidential elections of 23 April, after winning the center-right primaries to the detriment of personalities of the caliber of Sarkozy and Juppé.
"Now a new electoral campaign has begun", guaranteed the former prime minister who thus relaunches his challenge to the Elysée and to the favorite Marine Le Pen, precisely in the days in which many polls give him out of the ballot in favor of the centrist Emmanuel Macron. Fillon replied point by point to the various allegations made against him in recent days, recalling that "he was listened to for 4 hours by the police, and my wife Penelope was interrogated for 5 hours".
“Yes, I hired my wife as a collaborator – admitted Fillon -: she carried out this job for 15 years, for a salary of 3.677 net per month, a figure absolutely in line with her studies and the role covered. We are talking about one million euros, without remembering that that figure is gross and includes 15 years of work, it is too easy to put everything together to make a show”.
To those who accused Mrs. Penelope of carrying out this position (formally legal, it is allowed to hire family members) in a fictitious manner (this is where the offense would instead take place), the Republican candidate replied that "the absence of a badge and a email accounts prove nothing, anyone who follows political life knows that it is a very varied assignment, made up of many small things. My wife for example represented me in many local cultural events, she took care of my agenda ”.
Instead, Fillon admitted that he was wrong on the equally thorny question of hiring his two sons, who worked for him for 15 months for a salary of 3.000 euros a month. Hence the apologies to the French: "Everything was legal here too, but it was a mistake and I apologize". In short, a Fillon that he clarified the whole affair in detail, and that he also intends to publish all the contracts with the relative fees received by his wife during the period of collaboration. But that he does not give up on the electoral race: "It is not for the media system to judge me, but for French citizens and only for them".
