2023-05-11 18:29:02
An investigation has been opened against the deputy La France insoumise Carlos Martens Bilongo for suspicion of money laundering, tax evasion and abuse of corporate assets, the Pontoise public prosecutor’s office announced on Thursday, May 11, confirming information from BFM-TV.
According to the television channel, the 32-year-old “rebellious” is suspected of having concealed just under 200,000 euros from the authorities over the period 2018-2022 and is the subject of a procedure opened in mid-April. following a report from Tracfin, Bercy’s financial intelligence unit. The investigation is also open for failure to report to the High Authority for Transparency in Public Life (HATVP).
According to BFM-TV, investigators are sifting through several suspicious transactions. The MP is said to have received transfers to his bank accounts and cashed in several tens of thousands of euros in cash, even though he declared to the HATVP that he does not receive any remuneration from the companies he owns. Tracfin also reported to the courts an undeclared account abroad of which the deputy would be the holder, according to the chain.
“I will be perfectly transparent”
In a press release sent to Agence France-Presse by his lawyer, Arié Alimi, Carlos Martens Bilongo declared having discovered this investigation by the press and maintained that he had no account abroad. “To my knowledge, all of the sums paid into my company accounts have been declared in good and due form”he also said, while specifying that he had asked his accountant to verify that no “declarative error could not have been committed”. “I will be perfectly transparent on all of these elements both with the institutions and with public opinion”he added.
A teacher involved in the voluntary sector, Carlos Martens Bilongo was elected in June 2022 under the Nupes label, ending the fourteen-year term of office of local baron François Pupponi, a socialist figure from Val-d’Oise who had joined the party. presidential.
The deputy found himself in “one” of the news last November when the deputy of Gironde Grégoire de Fournas (National Rally) cut one of his interventions by launching “Let him return to Africa!” », causing an incident of a rare magnitude at the Palais-Bourbon. The condemnations of the rest of the political class are then unanimous, up to the Head of State, ” uneven “ by “intolerable words”. Mr. De Fournas receives an extremely rare sanction: exclusion from the Assembly for fifteen days of sitting and deprivation of half of his parliamentary allowance for two months.
Mr. Bilongo has also made a name for himself for his positions alongside environmental defense associations which denounce the project for a station of the future Grand Paris metro on the Triangle de Gonesse. The announcement of the opening of the investigation comes on the day of the publication of his first book, Black Frenchpublished by Philippe Rey, testimony on “its history made up of struggles, survival strategies, intelligence on the ground”.
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