The Corsican businessman established in Africa Michel Tomi was indicted on June 14 for suspicion of concealment of misuse of trust assets, a source familiar with the matter said on Friday July 1, confirming information from the weekly L’Obs.
According to the magazine, “the godfather of godfathers” at the head of a gaming empire in Africa is suspected of having received 8 million euros in commissions, more than ten years ago, on the sidelines of a market signed thanks to his interpersonal skills between the presidency of Gabon and an aeronautics company under Guinean law for the development of the presidential plane.
“Legitimate” commissions
“As soon as it comes to Michel Tomi, we twist the neck of the law”, lambasted his lawyer, Me Marcel Ceccaldi, who considered that the commissions were “legitimate” and the alleged facts “virtual”. According to him, his client cannot be prosecuted in France since, he argued, the offense of breach of trust was not constituted in the Guinean Penal Code at the material time. He will challenge his indictment. In December 2018, Michel Tomi was sentenced in Paris to a one-year suspended prison sentence and a fine of 375,000 euros, in particular for complicity et concealment of misuse of corporate assetsin a plea-guilty proceeding. He had been sentenced “for having illegally collected a commission of 1.6 million euros on the sidelines of a contract for the purchase of stars by the Gabonese state from a French company”, reported the newspaper Le Parisien.
Opened in July 2013 following a report from the Financial Intelligence Unit Tracfin, the judicial investigation had looked into the powerful relays of Michel Tomi in Africa and his links maintained with the leaders of this continent. After five years of investigation, the investigating judge Serge Tournaire had agreed to drop the most serious corruption charges and pave the way for an appearance on prior admission of guilt (CRPC), for secondary offenses. Formerly close to right-wing baron Charles Pasqua, Michel Tomi, born in Algiers in 1947, was convicted in 2008 of active corruption.
Guilty in the Annemasse casino case
The judges had found him guilty in the case of the casino of Annemasse (center-east), for his role in the financing of the campaign for the European elections in 1999 for the benefit of the political party Rassemblement du peuple français (RPF), five years following obtaining authorization to operate the gaming hall from the Minister of the Interior at the time, Charles Pasqua.
With AFP