44 DIRTY DIESEL – How Swiss Traders Flood Africa with Toxic Fuels | Chapter 5
5.3.2 – LYNX ENTERS THE BEAUTIFUL GAME
The Congolese context has not discouraged the newly formed Lynx Energy from entering this country too. In fact, Lynx started in Congo, in 2011, by buying X-Oil and its network of petrol stations, as well as its share in Sclog.40 Today, Lynx, which was founded by former employees of the Swiss trading company Mercuria, claims a 24 percent share in Congo’s retail market. Lynx hired a well-connected local agent called Donatien Mpika.41 Despite having no prior experience in the oil sector, he is currently head of Lynx Energy Trading Congo. Lynx makes no attempts to hide Mr Mpika’s previous positions: technical consultant to the Congolese Presidency’s Minister of Defence and consultant to the minister responsible for cooperation, humanitarian aid, and solidarity. Mr Mpika is considered by Congolese media to be close to Denis Christel Sassou Nguesso. He even participated in the organisation of a big event for the glory of the President’s son in 2009, the “Forum pour la consolidation de la paix au Congo”. He is, therefore, a useful business partner to have in Congo’s downstream sector. For this particular event, he was part of the working group that alone managed to spend well over three quarters of the event’s total budget of 3.6 million euros (of public funds, no less).42 Besides hiring Mr Mpika, Lynx wisely sponsors a football club dear to Brazzaville’s elite – “Les Diables Noirs”. Until 2013, the club was chaired by Hugues Ngouélondélé, who is currently in his third term as Mayor of Brazzaville, as well as being the President’s nephew and the brother-in-law, through his sister, of Edgard Nguesso, currently under investigation in France in a case known as the Biens mal acquis affair, meaning “Affair of the ill-gotten gains”.43 This football club has other murky histories, unrelated to the beautiful game. Until recently, it was managed by General JeanFrançois Ndenguet, head of the Congolese police force, the same man who, in 2004, was arrested in France for alleged participation in the “disappearance” of at least 353 Congolese (DRC) refugees during the civil war in 1999. Thanks to his diplomatic immunity, he was quickly released. Asked about its activities in Congo, Lynx didn't answer to our questions. 5.3.3 – TRAFIGURA’S SEAT AT THE HEART OF THE REGIME
When Puma Energy, Trafigura’s retail arm, entered Congo in 2002, it was taking its first steps onto the continent.44 Today, it claims a 43 percent market share in the country with 37 petrol stations. More than a decade after putting down roots in the country, Puma still benefits from a “tax exemption”, its 2014 Bond Prospectus says. Trafigura also knows how to position itself favourably with the ruling family – this time, through hiring a lady called Aurelia Mendes. Mendes described herself to Radio France International as the “Project Manager” in Congo for both Trafigura and Puma.45 Press reports have also said she works for the Swiss trading company, though we could not find her in either of the companies’
organograms. Asked to comment about Aurelia Mendes' role within Trafigura and Puma, Trafigura declined to do so. Aurelia Mendes also happens to be a close friend of Congo’s first lady, Antoinette Sassou Nguesso. This places Trafigura at the very epicentre of the family in power, as well as smack bang in the middle of the first family’s gross misappropriation of public funds: the President’s wife is cited in France’s Biens mal acquis affair as a beneficiary of the offshore companies discovered during investigation. France is also where Antoinette Sassou Nguesso chose to celebrate her 68th birthday, inviting no less than 150 guests, mostly from the Republic of the Congo, for five days to SaintTropez in May 2013. For an estimated cost of one million euros,46 reportedly paid by the Congolese treasury, they ate in the best restaurants in town, slept in five stars hotels and some or all of them were granted pocket money between 10,000 and 30,000 euros to shop in the luxury boutiques of Saint-Tropez.47 For some, this birthday was a double provocation. Many people, especially that half of Congo’s population which lives below the poverty line viewed the ostensible demonstration of (illegitimate) wealth as an insult. Adding to the insult was the irony that the party took place in the very country where the Congolese ruling family was (and still is) under investigation. Meanwhile, just as the party was underway, Congolese state TV chose to broadcast a report that showed the first lady proudly assisting the country’s poorest through her foundation, Congo Assistance. Congo Assistance may fund social support and healthcare, including partnerships to fight against drepanocytes, a disease that is widespread in Central Africa. But behind its noble aims, the foundation appears to be part of a propaganda machine to support President Sassou Nguesso. Why else would its website state that Congo is a nation where “free elections are held” when Antoinette’s husband (described by the website as a “genius”) has been ruling the country since 1979? 48 Congo Assistance certainly has several controversial individuals on its board. Maxime Gandzion, a former advisor to the President, received millions of dollars in commissions for acting as an intermediary between Gunvor and the SNPC in a crude oil contract that led the Swiss Federal Prosecutor’s office to open another money laundering investigation.49 Georgette Okemba is another controversial board member: her husband Jean-Dominique Okemba is head of Congo’s secret service and Chairman of the BGFI Bank Congo, in which the Gabonese Presidential family, the Bongos, have shares.50 Finally, one of Congo Assistance’s board members is… Aurelia Mendes,51 Trafigura’s key figure in Congo. Just like Antoinette, Mendes wasn’t busy with Congo Assistance when the party took place in Saint-Tropez: she was among the happy few to benefit from the autocratic clan’s “generosity”. But was she there as a friend of the first lady or on duty for Trafigura?
5.4 – ZAMBIA: FIDDLING WITH THE TENDERS “Commodity trading [sic] wins contracts mainly through commercial public tenders,” wrote Stéphane Graber, Secretary-