A French news magazine, Le Point has revealed that Minister Edgard Alain Mebe Ngo’o has been involved in dirty financial deals with a French company specialize in the sale of military hardware, uniforms, and handcuffs. According to Le Point, the information came from an investigation carried out by French financial experts at the heart of a system of corruption between France and Africa.

Edgard Mebe Ngo’o was named in the report during his time as Cameroon’s Minister for Defense. The paper reported that he used Colonel Mboutou, who was in charge of purchasing equipment for the Cameroon Army and a certain Maxime Mbangue, who was prominent in Minister Mebe Ngo’o entourage to arrange deals with Robert Franchitti, the boss of MagForce.

French financial crime experts carried out a search on the premises of the company – specializing in the sale of uniforms, rangers and handcuffs and discovered that Robert Franchitti paid Colonel Mboutou and Maxime Mbangue huge amounts of money in exchange for lucrative Cameroon military contracts.

Le Point spoke of the special and friendly relationship established between Robert Franchitti and the current Minister of Transport, Edgard Alain Mebe Ngo’o.

Telephone calls intercepted by the Central Office for the Suppression of Major Financial Crime (OCRGDF) in 2014 revealed that the two men were talking to each other and, above all, Robert Franchitti confided that he rented an apartment on the island of Jatte in Levallois- Perret for the minister’s son, Didier Mebe. He also offered him a new fridge for the apartment.

By Chi Prudence Asong
Cameroon Intelligence Report