Sarkozy writes about his time in prison: "Welcome to hell!"

ParisA month after being released from Santé prison, former French President Nicolas Sarkozy has published a book in France to explain his prison experience. The journal of a prisoner [The Diary of a Prisoner]. It's a 200-page book in which Sarkozy settles scores with French political leaders and talks about his time in prison. which only lasted 19 days and was full of privileges"I had climbed, one by one, the rungs of social life throughout my existence. I had just fallen ten floors in one fell swoop," he writes of his admission to Santé, the prison located in the 14th arrondissement of Paris.

"I never would have imagined myself passing through the walls of a prison. It wasn't even imaginable," the conservative confesses. On the day of his admission to the Santé, He writes, "I had to acknowledge that the unthinkable had happened." Sarkozy asks himself, "What crimes could I have committed?" and attributes the situation to having been President of the Republic, "a grave offense in the eyes of all those who hate political power, especially if it is right-wing."

The former resident of the Élysée Palace conveniently omits the fact that he has been convicted by the French courts in three cases related to corruption and illegal campaign financing. Of the three, the illegal wiretapping case and the case of illegal financing of the 2012 presidential campaign are already final convictions, while the case related to the illegal financing of the 2007 campaign by the Libyan regime—which led to his 19-day prison sentence—is pending appeal. The trial will begin in February.

Despite the convictions, Sarkozy proclaims his innocence, shamelessly speaking of a "conspiracy" and a "judicial scandal" to justify the conviction for Libyan financing. In fact, in the book he spares no criticism of the judges and dares to compare his case to the Dyon affair—in favor of Germany at the end of the 19th century—or to that of the Count of Monte Cristo.

During his time in prison, as prisoner number 320535, Sarkozy maintains that he received—and requested—no privileges whatsoever. However, his account suggests that he did receive privileges: from being personally received by the director of prison services to being assigned a single cell for people with disabilities—larger than the others—in an overcrowded prison, and having absolutely no contact with other prisoners. He also received privileges in other details, such as the fact that officials knocked on his door before entering his cell and addressed him as "President," or the controversial government decision to permanently station two police officers next to his cell for his security. In the book, the former president laments the harshness of the prison conditions: a cell—with a refrigerator and television—that he considers small, two windows through which he could not see the sky, and a very uncomfortable mattress. "I've never seen such a hard mattress, not even in the army during my military service. A table would have been almost softer," he says. However, Sarkozy admits that the cell was "clean and bright enough; it could have been in a cheap hotel." He also complains about the food, which he can't stand, not even the smell, to the point of refusing prison rations. For three weeks, he ate products bought at the prison commissary, such as yogurt, cereal bars, and sugary treats.

Unbearable noise

The former president also complained about the noise in the prison, especially when he opened his window and heard the other inmates shouting. "Some of my neighbors seemed to be mentally unstable. One of them kept banging on the bars with a metal object," Sarkozy stated. In his opinion, isolated from the other prisoners and surrounded by police, the atmosphere was "threatening." The noise continued at night. The former president claimed that his cellmate spent part of his first night singing a song byThe Lion King and banging on the bars with a spoon. "Welcome to hell!" he writes.

In the more political chapters, Nicolas Sarkozy demonstrates his resentment towards various political figures, even from his own party, such as the current conservative leader, Bruno Retailleau. His harshest criticism is reserved for the current president, Emmanuel Macron, whom he bitterly reproaches for withdrawing his Legion of Honor this year, the highest decoration of the French Republic.

Sarkozy's resentment spares only his family—especially his wife, Carla Bruni, to whom he dedicates loving words—and the leader of the French far right, Marine Le Pen, also convicted by the French courts. The ex-convict advocates breaking the already weakened cordon sanitaire against the far right. "They represent many French people, they respect the election results, and they participate in the functioning of our democracy," Sarkozy argues.