The Minister of Energy Transition denounced on Tuesday “false and slanderous allegations” following an investigation by the “disclose” investigation site on a company created by his father, part of the funds of which would be domiciled in Tax havens.
by Matthieu Goar
For the executive, the week’s program was tinged with green. Emmanuel Macron speech at COP27 in Egypt on Monday; Meeting on the decarbonation of industry at the Elysée, the next day. With these initiatives, the President of the Republic wanted to hand over the climate transition to the top of his agenda. But Tuesday, November 8, a journalistic investigation struck this communication with revelations concerning the family of one of the figures of the government on this file, Agnès Pannier-Runacher, Minister of Energy Transition.
According to the disclose investigation site, Jean-Michel Runacher, the father of the minister, created in 2016 a company called Arjumen. M Pannier -Runacher would then have signed the documents authorizing three of his children – minors at the time – to become shareholders of the company for the symbolic sum of 10 euros each. Former leader of Perenco, second French producer of crude oil, Mr. Runacher brought the rest of the capital: 1.2 million euros in the form of speculative investments. A way of having his descendants escape from inheritance tax.
According to the site, the whole of this heritage comes from hedge funds hidden in tax havens, Ireland, Guernsey or even in Delaware, “in which Perenco held his own investments at the time”, write the journalists. Tuesday, the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life (HATVP) announced that it has launched “checks” on the situation of the minister, which denies in block.
Faced with the attacks of a part of the opposition, M pannier-runacher found himself forced to respond quickly on several points, in particular the possible tax evasion concerning his nearby family and The potential conflict of interest with the Perenco company. “I became aware this morning of false and slanderous allegations published by Disclose,” she said in the National Assembly on Tuesday afternoon, during questions to the government. Before sweeping the first suspicion: “This transmission took place through a French company subject to French taxation, by notarial deed established in Paris and in full compliance with the provisions applicable by French law.”
Regarding Perenco, a company that has made a specialty to buy oil or gas wells at the end of life to exploit them as much as possible by producing at low cost, the minister denied having been in a situation to be influenced. “It is indeed a foreign company which exercises its oil activities outside France. I therefore did not have, within the framework of my functions as minister, to know of activities of this group,” she declared.
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