Mugabe ally loses EU sanctions compensation case

86      The first applicant’s claims that he was obliged by the Zimbabwean Minister for National Security to abandon his investment in the Congo no later than the end of 2004 and was persecuted by the Zimbabwean regime in 2006 cannot alter the conclusion set out in paragraph 84 above.

87      Indeed, even if the first applicant was obliged to dispose of his investment in the Congo at the end of 2004 and his relationship with the Zimbabwean Minister for National Security deteriorated subsequently, it is apparent from a number of press reports produced by the Commission dated 2006 and 2009 that he remained a business man who had an important relationship with ZANU-PF and other members of that party who were prospective candidates to succeed President Mugabe.

88      As regards the measures purportedly taken by the Zimbabwean Government against the first applicant following the part he played in the delivery of a letter proposing the retirement of President Mugabe, the first applicant’s argument is not convincing. First, as observed by the Commission, the fact that he was chosen to facilitate the delivery of such a letter to the President suggests that the first applicant was seen as an appropriate person to perform such a task in view of his relationship with the regime. Next, according to the apology letter annexed to the application and dated 18 July 2006, which the first applicant sent to President Mugabe, the first letter had been delivered to the President three years earlier. Questioned on that subject at the hearing, the applicants submitted that the reference to the first letter having been sent three years earlier is probably due to a typing error and that the author of the letter meant to indicate three months, not three years. Be that as it may, it remains to be explained why the regime reacted by imprisoning the first applicant for four days and withdrawing his Zimbabwean nationality, not when the letter proposing that President Mugabe should retire was received but only when the apology letter was delivered subsequently. Lastly, as observed by the institutions concerned, the way in which the latter letter was written indicates a pre-existing relationship with President Mugabe and expressly confirms not only the first applicant’s loyalty to the President but also his willingness and intention to play a constructive role in the future if the President so wished.

89      As a consequence, far from showing that, from a certain point in time, the first applicant became an opponent of the Zimbabwean regime or, at least, in fact severed his relationship with the regime, those circumstances are to be understood in a context characterised by a continuous relationship with that regime and by the first applicant’s intention to maintain that relationship in the future and dispel any doubt as to that intention.

90      That finding is confirmed by the fact that, according to a letter from Zimbabwean lawyers acting on behalf of the first applicant, the investigation launched in his regard did not result in any charges being brought and was abandoned.

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