To defend his personal interests, Jean-Michel Aulas has put the club in danger, accuses Santiago Cucci, executive president of OL, in an interview with AFP, while an open war now opposes the former leader and the new American owner John Textor.
What is the situation between Jean-Michel Aulas and OL?
“Jean-Michel Aulas, via his Holnest holding, initiated a procedure three weeks ago, in respect of which he succeeded in having all our accounts blocked for a short week in the middle of the transfer window. To defend his personal interests, he put the entire club at risk. In May, Mr. Aulas was taken out by John (Textor) because he had evidence that he was acting against the interests of the club. John then offered him an honorable exit with an agreement in which he (Aulas) undertook to stop acting against the club and to denigrate OL and John. In return, he became Honorary President and he still received compensation of ten million euros, subject to these clauses.
Since then, what has happened?
“It is well known that he has hired a communication agency which has been denigrating the club for several weeks. By doing this, he broke the agreement. And when someone seizes the club’s accounts, we are clearly acting against the interests of the club. It is estimated that having broken these two clauses, he is not eligible, not for a debt but for this commitment by OL Groupe to buy back 3% of the capital he held. It was not a debt. It was a transaction. This corresponds to a sum of 14.5 million euros. We think that, as he broke his agreement, this operation, in principle, cannot take place. The icing on the cake, technically this operation, this buyback of shares, cannot take place because the majority of the creditors (the banking pool) rejected it and as he is a director of the group, he is perfectly aware of this. We can’t do this operation.”
Also read: At war with Textor, is Aulas preparing a return to OL?
Concretely, what is OL’s current financial situation and what are the consequences?
“But the life of the club goes on, OL are solvent. He was just greatly disturbed for five to six days. When we publicly appear to say that we preserve the interests of the club and that we know the reality, it’s a little hard to take. The results ? There is few of it. Only in the very short term when we’ve been blocked. We handled that. 14.5 M EUR are blocked. I do not see why in relation to these guarantees the court ordered other guarantees on top of that. It’s still Kafkaesque. We were dismissed by the commercial court. It is therefore Doctor Jean-Michel and Mister Aulas. (…) we can disagree but we cannot put his personal interests before those of the club which he likes to remind that he is administrator and honorary president. Can an honorary president have their own club’s accounts seized? It’s a good question.”
