AND a scandal is coming to Monaco. Revenge is usually served cold, but in the case of the 67-year-old Claude Palmero, accountant of the royal family of Monaco for 23 yearsarrived just a few months after immediate dismissal for “embezzlement” which took place on June 6th, after two decades of honorable service (and before that his father Andrè had worked with Prince Ranieri).
Scandal in Monaco, the royal spending sprees revealed
The accountant, who disputes the accusations made against him and has dragged the matter to the European Court of Human Rights, entrusted none other than the French newspaper Le Monde his shocking revelations about the spending sprees of Prince Albert and the Grimaldi family. Revelations that will be published in a 4-part dossier entitled “Monaco, the secret notebooks”, for the joy of world gossip.
“I have never taken a cent,” declared Alberto’s former loyalist. “I deny all the accusations, I am neither corrupt nor a thief, all unlikely things of which the princely family unjustly accuses me.”
What’s in Monaco’s secret notebooks?
What they contain Palmero’s five accounting notebooks? On those pages the subterfuges seem to be noted for disguise the extra outputs of the Royal House Monegasque. From Charlene’s cookwhich would have been paid 300 euros per day, at the princess’s request to have it immediately 77 thousand euros in cash.
Le Monde also provides figures on the spending availability of the women of the Palace: Charlene’s annual endowment would be approximately 1.5 million euros, Caroline reaches 900 thousand euros and Stephanie 800 thousand. There would also be assets and accounts abroad, hidden funds and service personnel paid illegally.
Albert and Charlene of Monaco at the 2023 Christmas party. (Getty Images)
Prince Albert’s reaction was not long in coming, with this statement: «Mr. Palmeroperhaps believing he was a director for life, challenged my decision to remove him in court, attacking me personally and in offensive terms. His attacks on me, on the State and its institutions demonstrate his true nature and how little respect he actually has for the Principality.”
But the investigation by journalists Gerard Davet and Fabrice Lhomme does not mince words: «Palmero is the accountant who was able to hide from sight and make the Grimaldi fortune (more than 1 billion euros) profitable through a myriad of companies of which he was, by his own confession, the figurehead” they write in the first lines of their dossier.
iO Donna © ALL RIGHTS RESERVED