It will be necessary to examine: (i) the negotiations in detail to see whether there is anything to support the suggestion that Mr Boreh negotiated soft terms; (ii) the various agreements and documents which are said to amount to bribes or the promise of bribes; and (iii) the process of approval of the various agreements by the President to see whether he was relying in effect upon the advice of Mr Boreh in approving the agreements. The claimants contend that Mr Boreh was: "setting in chain a series of transactions that would deliver the proceeds of the land to Mr Boreh out of sight of the Government" and later that there was "no genuine intention for JAFZA to secure the sale proceeds for the Government", that point being made by reference to the proposal to pay the proceeds to JAFZA then have them repaid within a week. Lord Falconer said he completely agreed with that. There is no sensible basis for drawing an inference to that effect. As Mr Kendrick QC submits, in paragraph 6 can be seen the origin of the eventual agreement reached between the Government, ENOC and DP World: DP World paid for the construction of the jetty, which it managed and recouped its investment from the dues and Sheikh Mohammed, the Ruler of Dubai paid for the road links as a gift to Djibouti. It should form part of the JV agreement between DID and PAID." Me Dini also accepted in cross-examination that the fact that Mr Boreh had business interests in the Ports and Free Zone, given that he was appointed by the President in the knowledge that he had such interests, would not put him in breach of any public law duty in Djibouti law. In terms of the relevance of Mr Boreh's appointment as head of the DPFZA to the claim in respect of the Horizon shareholding, as I noted earlier in the judgment when summarising the claims, the claim against Mr Boreh in respect of the Horizon shareholding, that he was in breach of private law duties as a mandataire or public law duties as an agent public is in large measure founded upon the fact that he was appointed as the head of the DPFZA and therefore represented the Republic. Given the dispute, in the context of the contract for the sale of the land signed later by Mr Bouh which referred to a MOU, as to which MOU was being referred to, I propose to set out some of the provisions of that first MOU (in translation).
Mr Douale had expressed concern about delay by the Arab Funds as long ago as June 2001 and now, eight months later, things were still at a preliminary stage, the Funds were still asking for information (however reasonable their requests were) and there was no commitment.
Part of that reverse engineering is the claimants' reliance in their closing submissions on the point that a 40% shareholding would only have exposed the Republic to U.S. $12,800,000 of cash calls in the period 2003 to 2006 which could have been easily met from PAID reserves. In principle this was obviously a sensible idea, seeking to emulate the involvement of Maersk at Salalah. He said the state auditor would also have had responsibility to do so. Mr Handley says that Mr Moussa's reactions and responses were odd, awkward and sometimes aggressive. Mr El Hag was quite emphatic in his denial in cross-examination that Article 5 was ever invoked: 235.
In his evidence, Mr Bouh maintained that he had neither looked at nor asked the notary for the MOU. In the circumstances, the statement by the President in his first witness statement that: "I was not aware that the State owed any money to Soprim for work on the Presidential Palace" is almost certainly untrue. On the basis that the President and Mr Moussa clearly knew about Mr Boreh's shareholding and about the off-set in relation to the Soprim debt, it seems to me inconceivable that other members of the Government and senior civil servants involved with the project did not also know about the shareholding in general terms, even if they did not know all the detail. In the event, the first payment was made in November 2007 and the second in March 2008. In those circumstances, it is more than likely that he did discuss the draft MOU with the President and that it was the President who wanted the words "at agreed rent" to be inserted. On 19 March 2009, criminal proceedings were instituted against Mr Boreh for alleged non-payment of duty specifically in relation to cigarettes in transit to foreign countries.
This was to be expected. I do not consider that diluted allegation is correct either. That is no doubt correct, but in the present case which was one of a partnership, the two were intended to be essentially equal, as Mr Boreh confirmed in evidence. 717. 686. 506.