Posted 8 Feb. 2023 at 06:55 PMUpdated Feb 9. 2023 at 01:03 PM
The AGS is sinking into crisis. While the fate of its national director, Houria Aouimeur – summoned to an interview prior to dismissal – hangs on an audit report from the PwC firm, the CPME has decided to slam the door of this well-known employers’ association in the economic world because it covers the wages of failing companies. In the crosshairs of the representative organization of SMEs, the Medef is singled out for the opacity in which decisions are taken.
In a letter dated February 7 addressed to the president of the AGS, Christian Nibourel, the boss of the CPME, François Asselin does not mince his words. “By letter dated July 2021, I alerted the president of Medef, the majority organization on the AGS board of directors, to the fact that the CPME delegation within this body was required to deviation from most decisions”, he begins by recalling in the letter to which “Les Echos” had access.
“Verbal assurances”
“Verbal assurances were then given to us”, continues François Asselin, leading him to mandate at the beginning of December of the same year a certain number of members of the CPME to represent the organization on the board of directors and the control commission. of the AGS.
The “verbal assurances” of the Medef were obviously not kept. “In view of the latest events giving rise to the convening of several extraordinary board meetings, I regret to note today that our organization, a minority on the board of directors, has neither the means nor the elements to information allowing him to assume his responsibilities […] “, deplores François Asselin who therefore withdrew the mandates of his representatives.
Unhealthy record
Contacted, the Medef expressed its “misunderstanding”, but referred to the CPME to detail the reasons for its decision to practice the empty chair policy. Also contacted, the presidents of the CPME and the AGS did not respond to our requests for a reaction.
The boards of directors to which François Asselin refers in his letter dealt, at least for one of them, with various audits on the operation of the DUA AGS, that is to say of the team of the AGS housed within Unédic and headed by Houria Aouimeur. Mingle in this very unhealthy file filled with manipulation suspicions of abnormal lifestyle of the direction of the DUA, settling of accounts, or even moral and physical harassment, complaint in front of justice at the key.
Opacity
The reasons given by the CPME for withdrawing its entire delegation surprise some people close to the file, who point out that the representative organization of SMEs, sitting on the Unédic audit committee, is aware of the reproaches against the national director of the DUA, even if the audits have not yet been completed. Anyway, François Asselin’s decision comes as an extraordinary board of directors of the AGS was convened on Monday to examine the first elements of the PwC report, according to our information.
The opacity reproached to Medef also seems to be fueled by the attitude of the organization led by Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux on another, much more important affair. Houria Aouimeur was, in fact, appointed in 2019 to clean up the practices of the former management of the DUA with a certain number of administrators or judicial liquidators.
The general opinion is that the work was well done, but the suspicions of embezzlement are such that two complaints have been filed, one of which by the AGS, Unédic, Medef and the CPME. But François Asselin obviously can’t stand not being kept informed at all of the progress of this potentially explosive file.
In the meantime, the atmosphere is still sealed on the file: three different sources affirm that Houria Aouimeur was summoned, and knows it, for a preliminary interview with a view to her dismissal with layoff as a precaution. Contacted this Thursday morning, the National Director of the DUA affirms “to have not yet received anything in this direction to date”.