ZIAD TAKIEDDINE, THE SHADOWY FIGURE BEHIND SARKOZY’S TROUBLES
▶ French-Lebanese businessman ‘did not want to be alone in taking responsibility for the past,’ Colin Randall reports from Nice
Ziad Takieddine, an inscrutable businessman, has led a chequered business and private life. He has now emerged as the man most likely to bring about the downfall of the former French president Nicolas Sarkozy.
The French-Lebanese Druze, originally from Baakline, 45 kilometres south-east of Beirut, finds himself at the centre of an increasingly complex set of threats to Mr Sarkozy’s reputation, and perhaps also his liberty.
It was running an upmarket ski resort in the Alps that brought him into contact with influential political figures. From tending to the sporting and apres-ski comforts of the wealthy and powerful, he turned to the murkier world of arms dealings, acting as a go-between for French defence manufacturers and client states.
Mr Takieddine, now 67, is no stranger to high society, diplomacy and celebrity. His father and an uncle served as Lebanese ambassadors; his niece, the international human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin, is married to the Hollywood actor George Clooney. He has known fabulous wealth.
But in recent years he has presented himself more as a troubled man craving the truth to be told about some of the shadier negotiations and payments in which he has been involved.
The indictment of Mr Sarkozy, accused of accepting illegal financing for his winning 2007 election campaign from Muammar Qaddafi’s Libyan regime, leaves Mr Takieddine, in his own words, with a feeling of serene vindication.
French judges’ dogged pursuit of the former president intensified after Mr Takieddine, who had close ties to the Qaddafi leadership, claimed in 2016 that he personally delivered to Paris suitcases full of cash in three trips from Tripoli.
He told the Mediapart investigative website each delivery involved high-denomination notes amounting to between €1.5 million (Dh6.8m) and €2m, the three consignments amounting to €5m.
In total, taking account of allegations from other Libyan sources, Mr Sarkozy’s campaign allegedly accepted €50m from the regime – two-and-ahalf times the limit that applied, at that time, to presidential election campaigns.
Mr Sarkozy is the latest in a disconcerting series of leading French political figures to face allegations of corruption.
His predecessor, Jacques Chirac, and an ally who served under Mr Chirac as prime minister, Alain Juppe, received suspended jail sentences in a scandal over fictitious jobs for party cronies.
The late socialist president Francois Mitterand would almost certainly have faced prosecution had he lived long enough to be investigated along with former staff over the unlawful bugging of political enemies on his behalf.
Under French law, Mr Sarkozy’s status – placed under formal investigation – is a procedural step that could lead to trial but falls short of being charged with criminal offences. He denies all wrongdoing, claiming to have been targeted because of his role in the coalition that toppled Qaddafi.
But why did Mr Takieddine choose to speak out?
His lawyer, Elise Arfi, admits that in giving his version of events, her client – indicted in a separate bribery investigation – incriminates himself.
“He wanted the freedom to speak,” Ms Arfi told the French newspaper Le Parisien this week. “It must be understood that he is an intermediary and that when he renders services, it is for the benefit of others.
“Ziad Takieddine has endured the juggernaut of justice and he reached the point where he did not want to be alone in taking responsibility for the past.”
Mr Takieddine was married for 30 years to a Briton, Nicola Johnson. Their divorce seven years ago was a bitter one. Mr Takiedienne accused her of helping French authorities investigate money-laundering and bribery allegations. She complained of receiving only a modest alimony – €1,000 a month – despite his estate, including properties in London, Paris and the Cote d’Azur, being worth more than €100m.
One matter in which Mr Takiedinne has admitted a role was the so-called Karachi affair.
Commissions earned on defence sales to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia in the mid-1990s were not illegal but some of the money was allegedly diverted to help fund the unsuccessful 1994 presidential bid of Edouard Balladur, for whom Mr Sarkozy was campaign spokesman. Both politicians have denied involvement.
But after 11 French submarine engineers and four Pakistanis were killed in a Karachi bomb attack in 2002, speculation arose that officials implicated in the arms deal had exacted revenge for non-payment of fees.
“Yesterday, politicians, media bosses and business leaders dined in his Parisian mansion, dipped in his pool at Cap d’Antibes. Today, they turn up their noses,” said the news magazine L’Express in 2011
And there is a further twist to his story.
In an interview with France
Info after news broke of Mr Sarkozy’s indictment, he said the money he delivered was not intended for the presidential campaign after all. It was “destined for the Interior Ministry [Mr Sarkozy was the minister at the time] in connection with agreements between the two countries on the exchange of services and training”.
For now, Mr Takiedinne claims a sense a relief.
Pressed on Mr Sarkozy’s denials, he said: “French justice authorities have gone to the limit to put a stop to Mr Sarkozy’s lies … he is the liar.”