A serious fire ravaged, on the night of March 5 or 6, 2023, the warehouse of the Mocaf-Castel Brewery, a French giant in the production of alcohol in the Central African Republic, located in the locality of Bimbo south of Bangui.
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arson immediately denounced by Serge Ghislain Djorie, government spokesman
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assuring that an" investigation would be opened to find out the origin.
The Wagner group behind the fire?
No sooner said than done: a joint military and police operation led to the arrest in the hours following the fire of seven suspects in a motel near the warehouse.
The photo of these frail-looking men surrounded by soldiers was released by the Central African government.
However, the video surveillance images of the warehouse obtained by France 24 offer a divergent version, from different angles and at several times shortly before 1 a.m., on the nature of the fire and the attackers.
We see very clearly two groups of two arsonists, tall, athletic and in paramilitary uniform and controlled attitude, machine gun slung over their shoulders, in the process of throwing Molotov cocktails over the barrier of the warehouse.
If their face is hidden,
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MOCAF warehouse video surveillance 00 © NC
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MOCAF 2 warehouse video surveillance © NC
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MOCAF warehouse video surveillance 03 © NC
The "beer war"
According to an investigation by Jeune Afrique, the Wagner group has launched a "beer war" to supplant the French group in the Central African Republic in favor of its own brand "Africa Ti l'Or", one-litre plastic bottles produced in their brasserie in the Fourth arrondissement in Bangui. Vitali Perfilev, Wagner's representative in Bangui, set in motion his propaganda cell to discredit the French firm. "With each purchase of Castel, you are financing the war and you are killing yourself."
"Castel = terrorism."
Unequivocal leaflets appeared in the streets of the capital, quickly taken up on social networks... This reveals Wagner's strategy of conquest and economic predation in the Central African Republic, which intends to dominate in all areas: alcohol, mines, wood. , diamonds, cattle...
It is moreover the feeling of being gradually taken hostage by this rise in Russian power which would have prompted President Faustin-Archange Touadéra, Head of State, laboratory of Moscow's influence in French-speaking Africa, to engage discussions with the US administration at the end of February.
It is for the same reason that President Touadéra asked to meet Emmanuel Macron on March 2 in Libreville, on the sidelines of the One Forest Summit in order to “rebuild bonds of trust”, according to a Central African diplomat.
An interview of "pure formality" according to a diplomatic source in the context of the withdrawal of the last French soldiers in Bangui and repeated campaigns against Paris.
Three days later, the same Faustin-Archange Touadéra denounced from the podium of the summit of the "Least Advanced Countries" (LDCs) in Doha the fact that "the Central African Republic had been subjected since its independence to systematic looting facilitated by political instability maintained by certain Western countries or their companies which finance armed terrorist groups whose main leaders are foreign mercenaries..."
In 1993, the Castel group acquired MOCAF, present in the Central African Republic since 1953. This subsidiary is one of the largest producers and employers in the country.
The firm employs three hundred people and is the first tax resource in the country.
In 2022, an investigation was opened in Paris for complicity in crimes against humanity and war crimes after a report accused the French giant of having financially supported rebels in the Central African Republic.
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