Pacific / French Polynesia

Revival of Tahiti's OPT case to be decided in April

13:50 pm on 22 November 2018

Judicial authorities in French Polynesia have deferred until April a decision on whether to revive the OPT affair which centres on the territory's biggest case of corruption.

Photo: 123RF

In 2014, the case was thrown out over a procedural error, quashing the five-year jail sentences given to a veteran politician Gaston Flosse and a French advertising executive Hubert Haddad.

The court had earlier convicted Flosse for taking more than $US2 million in kickbacks for granting public sector contracts to Mr Haddad over a 12-year period until the middle of the last decade.

Flosse had admitted disbursing the money for private expenses.

Defence lawyers have been trying to stop a retrial, saying the statute of limitations applied.

The prosecution has been seeking a retrial but at a court meeting in Papeete yesterday found that the documentation to proceed to a possible reopening of the case was incomplete.