🔗 Share this article

The ex-president of France is preparing a book next month called Diary of a Prisoner, detailing his experience endured in jail.

The revelation emerged just 11 days after Sarkozy gained freedom as he appeals the court ruling related to illegal collaboration connected to efforts to acquire presidential race money from the government of Muammar Gaddafi.

Prison Experience: Solitary Musings

“In prison visibility is limited, and activities are scarce,” he reflects in one passage, indicating the book is more about his musings during solitary confinement as opposed to a broader observation on the strained and troubled French prison system.

“Silence escapes me, which is missing in that facility, where there is constant sound,” he adds. “The noise is alas constant. But, just like the desert, one’s inner world is fortified while incarcerated.”

Release Hearing: Sharing the Struggle

While appealing for release, he participated via screen from his cell, characterizing his incarceration as exhausting. He had told the court: “I must acknowledge those working in the jail, showing great humanity, and who helped make this ordeal manageable – since it’s deeply troubling.”

“I didn’t expect that at 70 years of age, I’d find myself behind bars. It’s an ordeal I must endure. I confess it’s hard, deeply straining. It has an impact all who experience it as it’s exhausting.”

Unprecedented Situation

He, who served as France’s president from 2007 to 2012, became the inaugural ex-leader in the European Union and the first postwar leader of France to experience jail.

Prior to imprisonment he mentioned he planned to utilize the opportunity for authoring a memoir.

Cell Library

Unconfirmed is whether he had time to read and critique the three books he took into prison: a life story of Jesus spanning two books together with Dumas’s work The Count of Monte Cristo, a plot where a wrongfully accused individual ends up incarcerated then breaks out to exact retribution.

Prison Conditions

Sarkozy was placed in solitary confinement due to safety concerns in a cell approximately nine square meters featuring a personal bathroom in the Paris jail in Paris. Security personnel occupied a neighbouring cell.

Sources mentioned his diet consisted only yoghurts during his stay due to concerns any food may have been contaminated. Although he had access to cook for himself yet he declined, based on unnamed sources. Not known is if the memoir includes his dietary choices.

Defense Viewpoint

Sarkozy’s lawyer, who visited his client daily while he was in prison, informed the court he would be safer outside jail than inside. “He has faced threats against his life, listened to yells during nighttime and the urgent intervention in a neighbouring cell when a prisoner self-harmed.”

Legal Proceedings

He entered custody in late October after a French court imposed a half-decade term for criminal conspiracy in connection with efforts to secure political donations for his presidential bid.

He denies wrongdoing and has appealed against the verdict, and another court case is scheduled for early next year.