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Paul Ismal Boro, Ibrahim Maga, Aboubacary Bah and Mamadou Zan Traor appeared in court on Thursday, July 18, 2024, to answer charges of damage to public property, corruption, favoritism and conspiracy among the crimes. The case was adjourned once due to the absence of three defendants, specifically Maritou Dembl, Fatoumata Coulibaly and Lon Samak.
The lawyer for the main accused, Paul Ismael Boro, said the referral was based on compliance with procedural rules. These are procedural requirements that must be respected necessarily and compulsorily and are binding on everyone, including the prosecutor as the prosecution party. It turned out that some actions were not taken, especially the notifications to some of the accused. Obviously, if someone did not receive the notification, we cannot judge whether he was absent or not. He explained that taking note of this evidence, the prosecution itself asked the court to remand the case.
Let us recall that in 2016, the State General Control Department discovered some financial irregularities following an audit of the budget execution operations of the Bamako International Conference Centre (ClCB) for the fiscal years 2014 and 2015. Among these irregularities, some involved fraud and other acts of corruption related to the execution of simplified contracts, in particular the payment of 93 simplified contracts using only proforma invoices for the amounts of 10,862,490 FCFA and 141,956,748 FCFA in 2014 and a total of 16,491,336 FCFA in 2015. 43 contracts were executed without purchase orders or work orders for the amounts of 38,231,725 FCFA in 2014; 1,180,000 FCFA and 49,354,506 FCFA in 2015.
In 2014, the execution of 18 contracts received with delivery notes instead of receipt reports amounted to 87,853,921 CFA francs. The execution of 17 contracts without service certificates resulted in the disappearance of 40,261,207 CFA francs.
However, 24 contracts without delivery orders were signed in 2011 for FCFA 27,120,270 and executed in 2015 for FCFA 531,000.
Other irregularities related to violations of the execution and supervision procedures for the award of public contracts and public service delegations, namely the execution of 12 contracts without competitive bidding in the amount of 15,878,405 FCFA in 2014 and 07 contracts in the amount of 31,401,895 FCFA in 2015.
Thus, following the report of the visit, the Office of the Prosecutor of the Economic and Financial Centre of Bamako requested the initiation of judicial information procedures against Paul Ismal Boro, Maritou Dembl, Ibrahima Maga, Fatoumata Coulibaly, Aboubacary Bah, Mamadou Zan Traor, Lon Samak, Oumar Sidy Coulibaly, Oumarou Coulibaly and Halima Maga, respectively, for damage to public property, corruption, partiality and conspiracy.
Oumar Sidy Coulibaly, Oumarou Coulibaly and Halima Maga have categorically refuted the facts against which they have been accused throughout the proceedings. To ensure his own defence, CICB Senior Manager Oumarou Coulibaly declared that the facts involved were of a financial nature and in no way fell within his area of responsibility. He insisted that he had never interfered with his colleagues to demand any benefits from service providers or suppliers.
Halima Maga, for her part, insisted that in her capacity as the CICB Financial Control Correspondent, she would never fail in her duties. She said that she had never approved documents related to the promise, liquidation and receipt of payment without the mandatory documents, specifically the invoices certified by the authorized officer, the contract registration certificate from the tax department, the purchase certificate, the pro forma invoice of the service provider, two competitive invoices and the contract.
CICB accounting officer Oumar Sidy Coulibaly declared that he had no authority to award public contracts and that he provided all the supporting documents normally required to streamline contracts.
The information does not reveal any evidence of the above-mentioned acts, as the report drawn up by the auditors does not mention any failures related to the above-mentioned management. Therefore, due to the lack of charges, the provisions of Article 211 of the Criminal Procedure Code are applied, declaring that there is no need to prosecute the above-mentioned acts.
The arrested Paul Ismal Boro, Maritou Dembl and Ibrahima Maga, among others, tried to exonerate themselves from the facts they were accused of. In fact, to ensure her defense, Maritou Dembl, who was the General Manager of CICB from 2012 to August 2014, declared that in order to curb the multiple expenses of CICB, especially the salaries of contract workers, the maintenance and upkeep of the grounds, in various facilities, she was obliged to violate the provisions of Decree No. N2015-0604/P-RM of September 25, 2015 on the Code of Public Procurement and Public Service Delegation, by awarding packages, even rewards and payments for several facility contracts, services and markets, without competition and without the necessary administrative documents in this regard.
Paul Ismal Boro, who served as CICB’s general manager from August 2014 to August 2015, declared that the selection of service providers or suppliers was made at his discretion, using not only CICB’s own funds but also state subsidies, in violation of orthodox financial obligations under the Public Procurement Act.
The head of the CICB supply department, accountant Ibrahima Maga, admitted that the expenditure files were created without receipt reports, delivery notes or proof of services rendered, in violation of the provisions of the Public Procurement Act which requires the aforementioned files to be created in advance before any payment is made.
However, the denials of the accused do not withstand a rigorous analysis of the facts. From the documents in the file, it appears that the auditors specified in their report all the facts and acts that constitute the financial irregularities indicated, and also specified the amount of losses caused by all these aforementioned irregularities. None of the explanations of the accused can contradict the findings of the auditors. It is reasonable to say that the facts of the attack on public property are established and that Fatoumata Coulibaly, Aboubakar Bali, Mamadou Zaan Traoré and Ron Samak deny any involvement in the entire process of the attack on public property, corruption and favoritism in the commission of criminal acts. However, it is clear from the documents that the name of the Accountant General, Fatoumata Coulibaly, insists that in emergency situations, management often disregards the principles of public procurement to award contracts and pay for them.
Mary Denble
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