ER Editor: Is this latest scandal going to bring down Macron? Are we witnessing another Boris Johnson moment? The France Soir article below gives us a sketch of the current Uber scandal, and names other, relatively serious scandals Macron has been at the heart of. So you have to ask, why this why now? We believe there is more to this than meets the eye.
Benjamin Fulford mentions Macron in this week’s blog post as another government that is about to fall, one of many upcoming, apparently:
In France, Macron’s party lost the parliamentary election and now a criminal investigation against Macron has started. On the surface, it is a story about Macron lobbying for Uber but that, like Boris Johnson’s parties, this is just a pretext for the removal of a corrupt and compromised ruler.
We’re publishing a story from France Soir, then a Zerohedge piece for wider vision.
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UberFiles scandal: Emmanuel Macron again in turmoil
FRANCE SOIR
After McKinsey, Rothschild and Alstom, among many other sensitive cases, here come the “UberFiles”. A new politico-economic scandal whose facts date back to 2015, and whose magnitude is (still) undermining the Macron government. And for good reason! On July 10, we learned through The Guardian that during his tenure as Minister of the Economy under François Hollande, Emmanuel Macron played devil’s advocate for the American ride-hailing company Uber, tackling French justice despite the national interest.
“You are buccaneers!”
Britain’s The Guardian newspaper retrieved thousands of incriminating documents about Uber’s international lobbying and then shared them with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. We discover the secret participation of the current French president.
We are in the summer of 2015, when Emmanuel Macron and Travis Travanick, CEO of Uber, build their plan. It is with their “Pop” offer that the American company plans to make a splash in France. The latter allowed everyone to improvise themselves as a driver, thereby crushing the market for French taxis. And, if this practice was quickly deemed illegal, Emmanuel Macron did his best to make it continue against all odds.
Between lobbying meetings, negotiations with the Directorate General for Competition, Consumer Affairs and Fraud Prevention (DGCCRF) and personal investment, the young French Minister of the Economy will obtain somehow the softening of the regulations for Uber. The other side of the coin is that French taxis demonstrated in large numbers, and this triggered strong tensions.
“Should we trust Cazeneuve?” Travis Travanick then asked Emmanuel Macron. Then Minister of the Interior – therefore responsible for the proper management of the demonstrations, the person concerned (ER: interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve) showed fierce opposition to the development of the VTC company (ER: VTC is a type of privately chauffeured car, thus outside the operation of France’s taxis) in France, their first export market. “You are filibusters”, hammered Bernard Cazeneuve to the leaders of Uber, knowing that they were under the influence of numerous investigations in France, both criminally and fiscally. Nevertheless, the Minister of Economy knows what he is doing. As Radio France reports, he responds:
“We had a meeting yesterday with the Prime Minister. Cazeneuve will silence the taxis and I will bring everyone together next week to prepare the reform and the good law. Caz accepts the agreement. When are you in Paris? Best.”
A few other times, while Uber rubs shoulders with French justice, Emmanuel Macron kicks it into touch. But most of the time, he takes care of it “personally”. Radio France summarizes as follows:
“The Uber Files reveal other direct, regular, almost familiar contacts between the leaders of Uber and Emmanuel Macron. Bercy (ER: French Ministry of Finance) seems to have taken control of the VTC file – a sector nevertheless placed under the responsibility of the Ministry of Transport. And Uber is grateful. For Uber, the reception in the other ministries is on the other hand much colder. In Transport and the Interior, we denounce the methods of “cowboys” or “pirates“ employed by the American company reluctant to comply with French laws.”
We know today that the French president did not hesitate to repeat this kind of practice, whether with the company Alstom, the consulting firm McKinsey or the Rothschild bank. While his party has just narrowly won a relative majority in the National Assembly , and the new government, barely formed, it is already subject to a motion of censure, this new revelation could well complete the “Macronie”.
From corruption to impeachment
Unsurprisingly, the web ignited upon hearing the news. Mainly on Twitter, Internet users are enraged:
Translation: We must now talk seriously about impeachment
Il faut maintenant parler sérieusement de destitution. #UberFiles
— Alexis Poulin (@Poulin2012) July 10, 2022
“While citizens are impoverished, conflicts of interest continue at the top of the state,” writes Jean-Baptiste Rivoire, founder of Off Investigation.
On the left, the national secretary of Europe Ecology the Greens Julien Bayou accuses:
“Macron or the one who put the lobbies at the heart of power. Highways, General Electric, Uber, banks, the list is long of private interests favored by the former Minister of the Economy who became President. Our country must regulate lobbies.”
On the right, the president of the National Rally Jordan Bardella is rather in agreement:
“It was public knowledge, the #UberFiles demonstrate it once again. Despite the permanent “at the same time”, the course of Emmanuel Macron has a consistency, a red thread: to serve private interests, often foreign, before national interests.”
For his part, the essayist Mathieu Slama summarizes thus:
“Macron was therefore the chief lobbyist of a company which disregards national regulations, makes tax optimization, refuses the status of employee to its drivers and imposes managerial practices violent. You have to realize the scandal…”
And some take the opportunity to put the other business of Macronie back on the table:
Translation: Let’s face it, the #UberFiles are nothing compared to the #RothschildGate and #McKinseyGate; why is the media talking about the first case and not the other two?
On ne va pas se mentir, les #UberFiles ne sont pas grand chose à côté des #RothschildGate et #McKinseyGate; pourquoi est-ce que les médias parlent de la première affaire et pas des deux autres ? 🤔
— Bastien Tell (@bastien_tell) July 11, 2022
In short, this still gives grain to grind to opposition to the majority of Together! This Monday, July 11, while Élisabeth Borne (ER: newly minted French PM) confidently goes to the National Assembly to attend the vote on a motion of censure tabled against her, it could be that this latest news reverses the steam.
Source
Featured image: Travis Travanick, CEO of Uber, and Emmanuel Macron 
AFP – F. Froger / Z9 – DR
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124,000 Leaked Documents Reveal How Uber Spread “F**king Illegal” Ride-Sharing Globally
A treasure trove of more than 124,000 confidential documents known as “The Uber Files” reveals the inside story of how Uber aggressively pushed into international markets.
The unprecedented leak to The Guardian and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and other media outlets shows how the ride-sharing service wooed prime ministers, presidents, billionaires, and oligarchs for access to their home markets between 2013-17.
The files cover Uber’s operations across 40 countries during a period in which the company became a global behemoth, bulldozing its cab-hailing service into many of the cities in which it still operates today. — The Guardian
Uber’s history of disregarding local laws and regulations and even conducting law-breaking activities were detailed in the cache of files containing emails, iMessage, and WhatsApp messages, including conversations with co-founder Travis Kalanick and top-level execs.
In a 2014 message to a coworker, Uber’s former head of global communications, Nairi Hourdajian, reportedly stated: “Sometimes we have problems because, well, we’re just fucking illegal.”
In an exchange between Kalanick and execs, the co-founder overlooked concerns about sending French Uber drivers to demonstrate against the taxi industry. “I think it’s worth it … Violence guarantee[s] success,” Kalanick wrote to colleagues.
There were also messages between Kalanick and Emmanuel Macron, who helped the company into the French market — it was noted that Macron, then economy minister, secretly brokered deals with opponents in the French cabinet to allow the company to disrupt Europe’s taxi industry.
In 2016, Kalanick met with then-U.S. Vice President Biden at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. He messaged his staff about Biden’s tardiness: “I’ve had my people let him know that every minute late he is, is one less minute he will have with me.”
Detailed in The Uber Files, company execs held 100 meetings worldwide in 17 countries.
The documents reveal for the first time Uber’s $90 million-a-year lobbying and public relations push to disrupt the global taxi industry.
In response to the data dump, Uber spokesperson Jill Hazelbaker admitted mistakes were made when Kalanick ran the company. However, his replacement, Dara Khosrowshahi, has been “tasked with transforming every aspect of how Uber operates” and has “installed the rigorous controls and compliance necessary to operate as a public company.”
“We have not and will not make excuses for past behavior that is clearly not in line with our present values. Instead, we ask the public to judge us by what we’ve done over the last five years and what we will do in the years to come,” Hazelbaker said.
One document revealed Uber developed a “kill switch” so that when authorities raided offices around the world, law enforcement seeking information on the company’s practices would be cut from access to the company’s data systems, thus preventing evidence gathering.
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Source
Published to The Liberty Beacon from EuropeReloaded.com
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