“Agnès Pannier-Runacher is still the government’s ‘Madame Propre'”comments a majority executive, in reaction to the affair revealed by the media Disclose. An investigation reveals that the children of the Minister for Energy Transition benefited from an endowment from their grandfather, a former director of the oil company Perenco, and that these funds came from tax havens. Agnès-Pannier Runacher is not “not one to break the rules”, added another executive. An argument repeated in a loop within the majority.
>> Agnès Pannier-Runacher suspected of conflict of interest: “It is the discredit that is thrown on our democracy”, reacts Anticor
Minister without interruption since 2018, the one who is now in charge of the Energy Transition has been scanned several times by the High Authority for the transparency of public life. At the top of the executive, we therefore believe that we have no reason to doubt, on the merits, his explanations. Even if, around Emmanuel Macron, we regret that the affair has eclipsed what was to be the great announcement of the Head of State: the decarbonization plan for the most polluting industries.
Thursday, November 8, faced with heated opposition, Élisabeth Borne stepped up to the plate in the Assembly: “We are in a hemicycle, not in a court”, annoyed the Prime Minister. It must be said that these revelations come at a bad time because Agnès Pannier Runacher must defend a text on renewable energies in the Assembly in the coming weeks. So far, no change of plan. “This law has nothing to do with the oil causeinsists an adviser. It is the acceleration and development of renewables, the opposite of oil”. The arguments are already in place.
Around Elisabeth Borne, we note that after the publication of the investigation by Disclosethe Socialists made it known that they were approaching the text with a “rather benevolent”. So at this point, don’t worry, “but the hours to come are decisive”, note, cautious, a Commission President. The fear is that of the serialization, of the rebound, of the justice which opens an investigation. “It’s tenable, if it stops there”, summarizes a communicator.
Because for the time being, no investigation has been opened. Agnès Pannier-Runacher, however, surrounded herself with big names from the bar to advise her: Christophe Ingrain, who already defends the Keeper of the Seals Éric Dupont-Moretti, and François Kopf, the former lawyer for Bernard Tapie. And the arguments are already sharpened. There is no conflict of interest, they evade, because the minister has not taken any decision in connection with Perneco, the oil company of which her father was one of the leaders, nor tax evasion because, even if the funds of the company he created for his grandchildren are domiciled in tax havens, the taxes are well paid in France.
As for the fact of not having declared the company in question to the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life, the minister’s lawyers point out that this was not an obligation because it is his children who are the partners. The entourage of Agnès Pannier-Runacher nevertheless specifies that she is at the disposal of the High Authority, which promises in-depth checks.