In Madagascar, the National Anti-Fraud Agency (ANAF) signed a contract worth 4.95 million euros in December 2021 with the British company Signum Intelligence Ltd, specializing in the sale of cybersurveillance equipment, and in particular Predator spyware. . The document of around thirty pages, to which The world has had access, provides a service, with technical assistance, over a period of three years.
This was paid from a line of credit taken from the budget of the Presidency of the Republic. This over-the-counter transaction and intended to “to be kept secret”according to the report submitted by the agency to the Public Procurement Commission, concerns the “supply of specific technical materials relating to the investigation for national security”.
A mission of “national security” which is not within the official prerogatives of ANAF. This is confirmed by its director and signatory of the contract, retired general and former chief of staff, Nirinjatovo Voahangy Andriamanalinarivo: “Our mandate is to dismantle the corruption networks that thrive on the illicit trade in Madagascar’s wealth, whether it is gold trafficking or protected species. We are not concerned with national security. The material was not intended for us, it was given to the presidency,” he explains.
“Legally”
The ANAF, which employs some 70 civil servants seconded from the gendarmerie, police, customs, the ministry of justice, etc., does not have within it experts capable of mastering cyberespionage tools like Predator.
Created in January 2021, the agency reports directly to President Andry Rajoelina. Its offices are located within the grounds of the presidential palace in Iavoloha, which can make it a convenient mailbox for discreet deliveries. Unlike other public entities dedicated to the fight against corruption and fraud, the agency, whose mission is officially to “coordinate and control state services involved in the fight against fraud” exercises the greatest discretion and has not published any report for three years. Only a collaboration with the mines ministry was announced in May, to track gold trafficking.
The existence of this contract between ANAF and Signum Intelligence confirms that after approaching the French company Nexa at the end of 2020, then responsible for marketing the Predator spyware, the Malagasy authorities formalized their project with the company British at the end of 2021, as indicated in October 2023 by the news site Mediapart and the consortium of investigative journalists European Investigative Collaborations (EIC) as part of the “Predator files” investigation.
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