Former Algerian Minister for Relations with Parliament Tahar Khaoua was sentenced on Wednesday to 10 years in prison for corruption.
Tahar Khaoua’s son, Zakaria, received a four-year prison sentence with the confiscation of all assets and real estate of the defendants, according to local media citing judicial sources.
The same sources add that Tahar and Zakaria Khaoua were also ordered to jointly pay 100 million dinars to the public treasury.
In addition, a sentence of three years in prison accompanied by a fine of 100,000 dinars was pronounced against the former wali of Batna, Mohamed Slamani, accused in the same case.
A one-year suspended prison sentence accompanied by a fine of 100,000 dinars was also imposed on the former director of the CPA Agency in Batna, Abdelaziz Abdelhak, for the offense of non-denunciation.
The other defendants in this case were acquitted by the court, which ordered the release of their judicial review.
The co-accused in this case are notably prosecuted for influence peddling with a view to obtaining undue advantages, illicit enrichment, money laundering, threat of defamation, acceptance of guarantee checks and false testimony.
The vast investigations into corruption and nepotism launched after the resignation in April 2019 of former President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, under pressure from an unprecedented popular protest movement “Hirak”, have led to a series of trials that are still ongoing.
Several personalities and former political leaders, as well as powerful bosses, senior civil servants and senior army officers are tried in the context of these trials. They are prosecuted, in particular, for corruption and illicit enrichment.
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