In footballing terms, this is what we could call a counter-attack. At the start of the week, Basile Boli, former French international and Olympique de Marseille legendto whom he offered the Champions League in 1993, was the target of accusations that were serious to say the least. After his career in sport, the native of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, launched into business with an ambitious project near Noyon, a town located in the Oise department. “A sports-studies school which you enter from the age of 14. We accompany the kids until they graduate. When they are good, they go to football, otherwise they continue in the sports economy”as he explained in February 2023 on the set of 12 shots of noon facing Jean-Luc Reichmann.
Since then, the project has been in trouble and the main interested party has also noted this in an interview with the magazine So Foot that he put an end to it. “We planned to do it in the south after all”declared Basile Boli, accused of having planted this school project in the Oise, arousing the indignation of many stakeholders in the project. “The bill was never honored. When I called him, he was on the plane, at the doctor’s… I managed to get him at the beginning of May and he hung up on me. I’m not going to sue because it would cost me more than what he owes me.”explains to Parisian a surveyor who accuses him of never having paid her the 14,000 euros he owes her.
Basile Boli denounces several problems which led to the failure of the project
Same story with the Parisian architectural firm responsible for the project. “His debt amounts to 260,000 euros. We have the biggest share: more than 150,000 euros”reveals a manager of the architectural firm. This Wednesday, after refusing to speak despite several previously declined contacts, Basile Boli agreed to give his version of the facts to the Parisian. “I’m shocked to have been called a liar and a crook. Especially since I don’t know the surveyor who made these comments. I strongly dispute his allegations.”he says.
For the ex-footballer, who remarried his ex-wife a few years ago, things are clear, he claims not to have “left a slate” under the conditions described by his accusers: “I cannot express myself too much on this point because a procedure is underway”he retorts regarding the amount he owes to the architectural firm, before adding: “However, he neglected to say that I paid part of it, I didn’t leave like a thief!” To justify himself, Basile Boli evokes several problems who did not allow the project to succeed, including one conflict between two local football clubs which he wanted to integrate into his action plan. “The mayor with whom I worked was in dispute with the new teamwhich paralyzed the project”adds the former glory of OM, prosecuted for breach of trust and exonerated a few years ago.
“The community of municipalities put pressure on me, they told me thata company wanted to buy the building we were targeting for the project. After all the distance traveled, the investment I had put into it, it was too much for me”concludes Basile Boli, who says to himself “sorry to the people who believed in this project” as much as him.
