The Trade court of Marseille suspends the right of approval that the Founder of Free possessed for the redemption of the shares of Bernard Tapie.
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In the fight of giants which opposes it to Xavier Niel to take control of the newspaper La Provence, the CMA-CGM group of Rodolphe Saadé won, Tuesday, January 11, a first point before the justice, without even participating in the Round. At the request of the judicial liquidator of the Bernard Tapie Group (GBT), the owner of the daily, the Commercial Court of Marseille suspended the right of approval negotiated by NJJ, the holding of Mr. Niel who holds 11% of the group. Provence, with M. Tapie, died on October 3, 2021. A decision that the shipowner hoped and who puts the two competitors on the same line while the Bobigny Commercial Court still has not opened their buyback offers, filed on November 30th.
The clause disputed by the liquidator Xavier Brouard responds to the Press Act of August 1986, which requests that any assignment of actions of a security be subject to the approval of its board of directors. But in the case of Provence, the statutes also required that any action movement could only be adopted “unanimity of the votes expressed” of the five administrators of the group. This article, tailor-made, allowed until then to NJJ, which occupies two seats on the board of directors via its subsidiary future development, to lock the shareholding and to consider serenely the redemption of the 89% of shares held up to So by Bernard Tapie.
“Unpublished situation”
In his order of reference, the judge considers that this clause “hinders the process of carrying out the assets of the Bernard Tapie (…), constitutes a clearly illicit disorder” and that it is therefore necessary to suspend it. A decision that he justifies in particular by “the very exceptional unpublished situation arising from the company’s dual position of the future development, candidate for redemption (…) and to decide on the approval of the buyer-buyer”. “It means that Niel could not be a player and referee of the” satisfied Bernard Vatier, a lawyer of Mr. Brouard, who brought these arguments on the bar on December 21st. “But the willingness of the liquidator is not to exclude the NJJ group from the race. The idea is to have the most open offerings for the commissioner”, continues the former baton in the Paris Bar.
Owner of the Nice-Morning newspaper, Holder for several years of a mutual economic project The productions of the great newspapers of the South-East, Xavier Niel, also a shareholder individually in the world, should not remain without contesting the decision On appeal. A visit from Anthony Maarek, the representative of NJJ in the South-East, is expected by the Trade Unions and then Corse-Morning, which now belongs to the same group, Friday, January 14th.
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