French anti-corruption prosecutors have opened an investigation into President Emmanuel Macron’s chief of staff Alexis Kohler over his links to Italian shipping giant MSC, a statement said on Monday. The national financial crimes’ prosecutor office said it would check whether Kohler respected conflict of interest rules for civil servants as he “could have dealt with issues of interest” to MSC. The revelations form the basis of the legal complaint filed by transparency campaign group Anticor last Friday. Kohler left the economy ministry in 2016 to join Swiss-based MSC as finance director but continued to work on Macron’s bid for the presidency in his spare time. A graduate of Sciences Po university and the elite ENA school for civil servants, like Macron, Kohler was rewarded with the top position in the presidential palace in May 2017.

Source: Punch June 04, 2018 09:56 UTC