The possessions of former senior officials from the Bouteflika era convicted of corruption will be sold at auction, to reimburse the Public Treasury for part of the embezzled sums.
This is a significant potential windfall for the State. Auctions of property belonging to former senior officials and businessmen detained in connection with corruption cases are scheduled, starting on Sunday, January 21, by the General Directorate of Estates of five municipalities of Algiers. To know Zeralda, Cheraga, Draria and Bir Mourad Rais.
The recovery of these assets, which is part of the execution of the final judgments handed down by the Supreme Court, had already been marked at the end of last year by the sale of the shopping center in Bab Ezzouar belonging to Ahmed Mazouz, ex-oligarchs of the Boutflika regime. This time, furniture, household appliances, clothing, and luxury items are being offered at auction.
The value threshold for all seizures is defined according to the damage caused to the public treasury. The former boss of the automobile sector, Mahieddine Tahkout, l One of the most influential businessmen under the presidency of Abdelaziz Bouteklika (1999-2019), for example, owes a total of 309 billion dinars to the State. This is the largest amount of funds embezzled, judges estimate, through the granting of undue advantages bribes which were used to purchase luxury vehicles, factories, lots of land, villas, hotels, pleasure boats, jewelry, etc.
30 billion dollars recovered
Next come the Kouninef brothers – Réda, Noah-Tarek, and Abdelkader-Karim –, close to the Bouteflika family, who caused, still according to the judicial file, a loss to the public treasury amounting to more than 275 billion dinars, followed closely by Mourad Eulmi, former boss of Sovac, which must reimburse the State a total of 223 billion dinars.
In a speech delivered in December 2023 before both houses of Parliament, the head of the State Abdelmadjid Tebboune announced the already effective recovery of the equivalent of 30 billion dollars, notably in cash, industrial units, and real estate locally and abroad. In Algeria, there are no less than 4,200 real estate properties, 229 agricultural lands, 401 lots of industrial land, 6,400 bank accounts, 99 bank securities, 25 yachts and boats, 4,203 heavy-duty buses and trucks, 821 utility vehicles, 1,330 large machines, 236 agricultural machines, and 7,000 tourist vehicles, as well as several dozen factories tourist complexes and television management companies that have been recovered, according to a tally from the Ministry of Justice established in December 2022.
Some of these goods are among those which will gradually be sold at auction. Added to this are the properties of former senior politicians and businessmen whose judgments are not yet final, as well as ill-gotten assets that have not yet been uncovered or have been transferred abroad, and for whom 220 letters rogatory and requests for mutual legal assistance have been issued at around thirty of a country.
