French industrialist Vincent Bolloré will stand trial in December before the Paris criminal court in the so-called “African ports” case.
He is being prosecuted for alleged corruption of foreign public officials and aiding and abetting breach of trust, linked to the 2010 presidential campaigns in Togo and Guinea. Investigators suspect that subsidiaries of the Bolloré Group provided under-priced communication services to the campaigns of Faure Gnassingbé and Alpha Condé.
In return, the group is alleged to have secured control of two strategic ports Lomé in Togo and Conakry in Guinea.
A collective of non-governmental organisations from Togo, Guinea, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Cameroon, operating under the name “Restitution for Africa,” has accused the Bolloré Group, Bolloré, and his son of unlawfully obtaining favours to operate ports and subsequently “laundering” money in those countries through the sale of its Africa logistics business.
The investigation into the case was opened in 2013 and led to the indictment of Bolloré and two senior executives of his then-subsidiary, Euro RSCG, now Havas, in 2018.
In 2021, Bolloré admitted to the facts under a guilty-plea procedure and agreed to pay a €375,000 fine, but the Paris court rejected the deal, paving the way for a full trial.
The Bolloré Group’s African ports and logistics business which the tycoon sold in 2022 employed more than 20,000 people across 20 African countries.
The unit operated 16 ports, along with warehouses and transport hubs across the continent.
Cyrille Bolloré, his youngest son, became head of Bolloré Africa Logistics in 2019, succeeding his father.
TNAM
Edited By Egwu Patience Nnennaya.
