Paris (AFP)

The Paris Court of Appeal confirmed Thursday the placement in bankruptcy of the companies of Bernard Tapie, condemned to reimburse more than 400 million euros in the arbitration case, an amount which he disputes, learned l 'AFP from concordant sources.

This decision is a new victory for creditors who have been trying unsuccessfully since 2015 to obtain reimbursement for this arbitration, which is supposed to settle the dispute between Mr. Tapie and Crédit-Lyonnais in the case of the resale of Adidas in 1993.

The businessman's companies, on which this debt weighs, have been placed in receivership since a decision of the Paris Commercial Court on January 18, 2019. On that day, the court also rejected a 2nd repayment plan proposed by Mr. Tapie to spread the payment of his debt over six years.

Seized of the former minister's appeals, the Court of Appeal confirmed these two decisions on Thursday, according to a judicial source and a press release from the Consortium de Réalisation (CDR), the entity responsible for the legacy of Crédit Lyonnais.

Meanwhile, the former boss of Olympique de Marseille, who is fighting at 77 against metastasized cancer, has proposed a 3rd reimbursement plan, involving the sale of the Hôtel de Cavoye, his Parisian residence. This plan is currently being examined by the Bobigny Commercial Court, which is to issue its decision on April 30.

In the decisions of the court of appeal, "the ability of the companies of Bernard Tapie to repay the liabilities is never in doubt," welcomed his lawyer, François Kopf, to AFP.

In addition, "the 80 million euro sales agreement concluded a few days ago for the Hôtel de Cavoye covers the first two years of the reimbursement plan, which meets the concerns of the court", a- he announced.

Finally, according to the lawyer, "the acquittal judgment" of July 2019 in the criminal trial "ordered the raising of more than 60 million euros in seizures, which Bernard Tapie asked to pay directly to the CDR" adds- he. "Now the CDR opposed it, which confirms that its real intention is not to recover the sums but to put Bernard Tapie on the ground," he said.

If the third plan is rejected, the court could order the compulsory liquidation of the companies GBT (Groupe Bernard Tapie), majority shareholder of the media group La Provence, and FIBT (Financière et Immobilière Bernard Tapie), which owns the Hôtel de Cavoye and the Mandala villa in Saint-Tropez.

But Bernard Tapie has repeated it several times: even in the event of liquidation, his creditors would not, according to him, receive any euro until the exact amount of his debt, the object of bitter procedural battles, has not been definitively settled .

In the last episode, on February 28, the Paris Court of Appeal decided that this debt amounted to 438 million euros, according to the judgment consulted by AFP. Mr. Tapie's lawyer however announced a cassation appeal.

In criminal proceedings, Bernard Tapie was released in July from the accusation of fraud, but the Paris prosecutor's office appealed.

The initial approval of a first plan to save its companies in 2016, which was ultimately rejected, was also the subject of judicial information opened in August 2017 in Paris for suspicions of "judgment swindle".

© 2020 AFP