The anti-corruption association Anticor announced on Wednesday June 28 that it had filed a complaint against X on June 20, suspecting that motorway concessionaires were favored by the Valls government during the conclusion of the Motorway Recovery Plan (PLA) in 2015 . This folder “has a direct economic impact on citizens”said Anticor President Elise Van Beneden. “It is clear that the State could have collected more royalties, and the citizens, paid less at the tolls”she says.
The complaint, revealed on Wednesday by “Further Investigation” and Mariannethen consulted by Agence France-Presse, denounces “an exceptional enrichment of the motorway concession companies which can exactly be analyzed as an unjustified advantage”. The complaint seeks to “question the responsibility of public decision-makers under the presidency of Mr. Hollande in the negotiation with the private sector of the concession of public goods: highways”explains M.me Van Beneden.
In 2015, a memorandum of understanding worth nearly 3.3 billion euros was signed between concessionaires (APRR, AREA, ASF, Cofiroute, Escota, Sanef, SAPN, etc.) and the State, more particularly the ministries of economy and the environment, headed by Emmanuel Macron on the one hand and Ségolène Royal on the other.
It was Alexis Kohler, current secretary general of the Elysée, and Elisabeth Borne, current prime minister, who had taken care of the negotiations, note “Complementary investigation” and Marianne. They then headed the cabinets of Emmanuel Macron and Ségolène Royal respectively.
“A completely unjustified advantage”
Anticor estimates that the debt ratio used in the PLA was “grossly undervalued”. What “makes it possible to increase the theoretical remuneration of motorway concession companies whose extension of the concession contract is requested”writes the association, suspecting “a completely unjustified advantage and contrary to the public interest”.
The financial estimates used to establish the agreement “did not correspond to the financial reality of these motorway concession contracts”, according to Anticor, but have ” Nevertheless [été] provided by the transport infrastructure department” of the Ministry of Ecological Transition. The association sees “an apparent concealment of the real conditions under which the representatives of the State were able to estimate the profitability of the concession contracts”.
Asked, the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office said on Wednesday that it had not yet received the complaint, which it will have to analyze before deciding whether or not to open an investigation. Administrative justice annulled on June 23 – three days after the filing of this complaint – the judicial approval which allowed Anticor to intervene in cases of the fight against corruption, noting a “lack of transparency” on a donation received in 2020. Anticor will challenge this cancellation before the Paris administrative court of appeal and has filed a new application for approval.