Coalition Avenir Québec has landed Jacques Duchesneau, the province's outspoken corruption watchdog, as a star candidate in the 2012 election.

Radio-Canada sources confirm that Duchesneau, a former Montreal police chief, will run for the upstart party in an undisclosed riding, and his candidacy will be announced on Sunday.

Duchesneau led Quebec's anti-collusion squad investigating allegations of corruption in the province's construction sector and illegal political party financing.

It was the leak of his explosive report in the fall of 2011 that finally pushed Charest to name a provincial inquiry into corruption after resisting public pressure for almost two years.

At the Charbonneau commission, Duchesneau testified that Quebec political parties are awash in dirty money, with up to 70 per cent of their cash raised illegally.

Duchesneau first came into the public eye during a corruption investigation in the 1980s.

Then a young sergeant-detective, he arrested his own boss on the Montreal police drug squad for stealing cocaine and hashish from an evidence locker.

The supervisor, a legend touted as a future chief, went to jail.