French President Nicolas Sarkozy has announced he is to sue Mediapart over its report of plans by the former Libyan regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi to fund his presidential election campaign in 2007. Mediapart Editor-in Chief Edwy Plenel explains here why Sarkozy’s reaction, and the accompanying denials of two protected former Gaddafi henchmen, were anything but a surprise.
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Mediapart stands by all the evidence it has revealed of plans by the former Libyan regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi to fund Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidential election campaign in 2007. Our reporting was legitimate and trustworthy.
Since our report was published on Saturday, there have been two reactions, both predictable.
Moussa Koussa, the former head of Libya’s foreign intelligence agency who signed the letter revealed in our report, was quoted by news agency Agence France-Presse as saying: "All these stories are falsified. It is clear that all that is being said is without foundation. The matter does not deserve further examination."
Similarly, Bashir Saleh, Gaddafi’s chief of staff at the time and to whom the letter was addressed, issued a statement through his lawyers on Monday casting doubt on the authenticity of the document published by Mediapart this weekend and which he claims he never received.
Like Saleh, Koussa is protected by France, which helped him to leave Libya, and by Qatar, where he is now living peaceably after passing through London.
Yet, according to a BBC Panorama report last October, Koussa is suspected of being involved in torturing opponents of the Gaddafi regime. Saleh is the subject of an international 'wanted' list published by Interpol, called a 'red notice', issued to the organisation's member countries for his arrest on behalf of Libya where he is wanted for alleged fraud. Saleh is named on Interpol’s fugitive file (see here) as Bashir Al Shrkawi, the name in which a passport was issued to him in his native country Niger.
Thus, both the person who signed the letter and the person to whom it was addressed are protected by France and its ally, Qatar. These countries were not prepared to give them up to the new authorities in the very country they claim to have liberated from a dictatorship, even though Koussa and Saleh were essential cogs in the wheels of that same dictatorship.
Clearly, we cannot exclude that this protection is linked to the very facts which are at the heart of our investigation.
The second predictable reaction was that of Nicolas Sarkozy who, armed with these two denials, told France 2 television channel on Monday that he planned to sue Mediapart. "We have cut the head off this rag. It was a forged document. Mediapart is a house of ill repute. With Monsieur Plenel it is a put-up job every time. This document is a crude falsification."
With the support of its readers, Mediapart will confront this lawsuit with serenity. It is brought by an outgoing president and candidate whose hatred for the freedom of the press and the journalistic profession can be seen right up to and including his announcement of this legal move.
François Hollande, the opposition candidate in the second round of the presidential election this coming Sunday, replied on Europe 1 radio station on Monday to allegations from the Sarkozy camp that there had been collusion between Mediapart and the Socialist Party Hollande represents.
"This is an investigative news website and it has sometimes happened that it accuses political personalities on the Left," Hollande said. "So I do not see how it could be established that there could be some sort of relationship or confusion between the Socialist [Party] and this news site which, I would remind you, is staffed by recognised journalists.”
“You may or may not like them, but they are journalists who have demonstrated their competence on several issues,” he added.
"How could anyone think I could have inspired anything or anyone?" he continued. "Do you think I need newspapers that conduct investigations? Do you think that is how I plan to win the presidential election?"
As our faithful readers know very well, Mediapart has no electoral agenda. Its only agenda is journalistic; to reveal everything that is of public interest. We have been involved in lengthy investigations, and we publish every new development in a story as soon as that is possible – that is, immediately after each has been thoroughly sourced, checked and explained.
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English version: Sue Landau
(Editing by Graham Tearse)