PARIS (Reuters) – French Energy Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher will recuse herself from making decisions in any dossiers involving her father’s former employer, Anglo-French oil company Perenco, the French government said in a decree published on Tuesday.
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne will instead handle any dossiers related to Perenco, to oil services group EP2C and to defence firm Defense Conseil International (DCI), the decree, published in France’s Journal Officiel, stated.
The decree specified the rule had been proposed by Pannier-Runacher.
This month, France’s public standards watchdog said it would look into media reports about assets held by Pannier-Runacher’s children after investigative media reported that Pannier-Runacher’s father had made her three children shareholders of a company with assets of 1.2 million euros ($1.2 million) with the aim of avoiding inheritance tax.
Pannier-Runacher had not declared the existence of this company to the watchdog, the High Authority for Transparency in Public Life (HATVP), when she was appointed a minister.
Pannier-Runacher has denied all allegations of misconduct but last week in parliament she said that in 2016, her father had wanted to prepare his succession via direct transmission to his grandchildren and that this was set up via a French company, paying French taxes and in respect of all French legislation.
Campaigners said that while she was not legally required to report her children’s assets, the company’s links with the oil industry created a conflict of interest, since Pannier-Runacher, as energy minister, is tasked with reducing France’s reliance on fossil fuels.
HATVP has said it will look into the matter.
Pannier-Runacher has also denied all links with her father’s former employer, Anglo-French oil company Perenco.
The decree published on Tuesday did not say why the minister had to recuse herself for decisions involving DCI.
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(Reporting by GV De Clercq; Editing by Gareth Jones)
