Usually, when I introduce myself, this is more or less what I say: I am French, born in 1944, a broker in raw materials and an intermediary on behalf of major companies. I have natural leanings towards Africa, but I travel the world over, increasingly in the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa).Throughout my career, in parallel with my business concerns, I have been involved in diplomacy of influence, making use of my personal relationships with heads of State and political leaders to facilitate peace negotiations.But if I had to sum up my life, for the benefit of the young people who will come after me, what has gone before and what is to follow can be expressed in one sentence: anything is possible; do not believe those who tell you the contrary; believe in yourself whatever your origins or whatever the circumstances!There has been nothing exemplary in my life but that.Fracture the destiny of a pied-noirI was born on the 8th of October 1944 in Algiers, so a pied-noir (the name given to French and European citizens who lived in French Algeria prior to independence literally black foot). My father, Claude-Alexis Ollivier, was a mechanical engineer. My mother, Eugnie Tabet, took care of my two younger brothers, Marc and Pierre, and myself. When she was asked which of her children she loved the best, she answered: The one who needs me most.We were lucky enough to be loved and to have had parents who loved each other.However, as time went by things were not always so easy.I dont even have thebac(the French high school diploma). I attended school in Algeria until 1962 when my family, like a million other French people in Algeria, had to flee the country they called home. For my part, at seventeen years of age, I had sided with the notion of a French Algeria. I had carried secret messages to Paris. This resulted in my arrest, strong-armed interrogations and five months of remand custody before I was finally released.This experience affected my whole life. Try though I might to settle into a high school in Paris, where my family had moved, life had taken hold of me and drawn me out of the cocoon of the educational system. Much later, when I was nominated by Prime Ministerial decree, the Managing Director of CDF-Chimie welcomed me by asking Who are you? What path did you take to end up on my Board of Management? I replied, Prison.My first steps as a brokerOnce again, theres so much more to be said. Fresh out of prison and unsuitable for school, I went to London in 1964 so that I would not be a burden to my parents. Penniless, I pinned all my hopes on a small ad in The Times: Need a French cook for your dinner party? Please call. After six months spent as a stopgap chef, I got an internship at the trading company of Strauss, Turnbull & Co., where I was initiated into the gold trade, in particular with South Africa.This is where I got my foot in the stirrup. In 1966, I returned to Paris, and armed with a recommendation from my London employer, I was taken on at J.A. Goldschmidt SA where I looked after cereal trading, destined for Africa in particular. In 1969, I became Sales Director at Grainex SA. I succeeded in breaking into the Chinese market, right in the middle of the Cutural Revolution.Between 1970 and 1975, I extended my field of action to the Middle East, to Japan and to Bangladesh as Director for International Development at the Algerian Milling Company (CamSA).In 1975, I became my own boss at the head of the Arinco group, a trading company specialising in grain. After the first oil crisis, I became more and more interested in hydrocarbon, all the more so since I had forged many contacts in the Middle East that allowed me access to the ruling spheres of the Arab peninsula and Sudan, too. In 1980, I partnered at Vitank with Henk Vietor, a key figure, perhaps even a legend in the world of oil.South Africa : a plot for peaceIn 1981, a reconnaissance trip to South Africa, at that time the country of apartheid, awakened old memories inside me. It was likedj vufrom my Algerian youth: here too, a community blind to sharing its country with the majority of the inhabitants was at risk of being cast adrift.As I was in business with the front-line countries, in particular Marxist Mozambique, I decided to get involved in favour of peace for southern Africa and a negotiated end to apartheid.At that time I advised Jacques Chirac, the Mayor of Paris and later Prime Minister, in an informal manner on international questions. At his request, I went on a secret mission in 1985, with a view to freeing the French hostages in Lebanon (Marcel Fontaine, Marcel Carton, Jean-Paul Kaufmann and Michel Seurat). During the course of this mission, I notably travelled to Iran under cover as a member of a delegation from Mozambique.In 1987, with the support of Jacques Chirac, I acted as an intermediary for secret contacts between the front-line states and the country of apartheid. All of southern Africa, from Mozambique to Angola, was at war at the time. To initiate the beginnings of trust, over seven months I negotiated a vast exchange of prisoners, which also allowed the release of two anti-apartheid militants who were being held in South Africa, the volunteer worker Pierre-Andr Albertini and the Dutch anthropologist Klaas de Jong.On the 7th of September 1987, at Maputo airport in Mozambique, 133 Angolan soldiers and around 50 SWAPO fighters from the Namibian independence movement were exchanged against Captain Wynand DuToi, who had been captured two years previously in Angola while he was attempting to sabotage oil installations in the Cabinda enclave.On the 13th of December 1988, the Brazzaville Protocol, which was ratified nine days later at the headquarters of the United Nations in New York, mandated the withdrawal of some 50,000 Cuban soldiers stationed in Angola and the withdrawal of South African soldiers to within their own borders, paving the way for independence for Namibia, which had been occupied by South Africa up to then and used as a rear base from which to wage war on Angola alongside the rebel Jonas Savimbi (UNITA).The Brazzaville Protocol, which would never have seen the day without the mediation of the president of the Congo, Denis Sassou NGuesso, conjugated my efforts in the background with the American policy known as constructive engagement carried out in broad daylight by Chester Crocker, Ronald Reagans Mister Africa.Thirteen months later, in February 1990, Nelson Mandela left his cell a free man after twenty-seven years in detention. My plot for peace had succeeded; the idea that the Apartheid regime, once it had accepted to make peace with its Marxist neighbours, would also accept to negotiate with Mandelas ANC for a peaceful end to apartheid. This story, and its many unexpected developments, is told in the South African documentaryPlot for Peace(2013).Decorated by the old and the new South AfricaThe documentary ends with Mandelas release. In reality, I continued to smooth the way for a new South Africa. In 1990, in particular, I worked behind the scenes to organise the presidential visit to Paris by Frederik De Klerk, the first visit to France by a South African head of state in more than forty years. De Klerk was welcomed by the French president Franois Mitterrand, who had supported my actions in southern Africa after the end of the coalition with Jacques Chirac.In 1994, when Mitterrand was in coalition with Prime Minister douard Balladur, I was madeChevalier de la Lgion dhonneur(I had already received the title ofChevalier de lordre National du Mritein 1987).My source of pride. In 1995 Nelson Mandela elevated me to the rank of Grand Officer of the Order of Good Hope, the highest decoration in South Africa, an order into which I had entered in 1987 when Roelof Pik Botha, the head of South African diplomacy, decorated me for my role in the exchange of the prisoners of war at Maputo.Thus, I am the only foreign citizen to have been decorated by both the old regime and the new post-Apartheid South Africa (many other African countries have also given me honours. Amongst others I am Commander of the Congolese Order of Merit,Grande-croix de ltoile dAnjouan.I am also Honorary Consul for Mozambique in the Republic of the Congo).Finally, I was promoted to the rank of Officier de la Legion dhonneur, in April 2015.A new venture: the Brazzaville FoundationSince 2014, Im engaged in a new venture with the creation of the Brazzaville Foundation, inspired by my friend the Congolese president Denis Sassou Nguesso and of wich Im the President. A quarter century after the signing of the Brazzaville agreement, the Foundation aims to perpetuate the both the spirit and themodus operandiof this historic achievement which are predicated on informal dialogue and strict confidentiality as means to bring about peace in high-stakes, high-risk situations.The Foundation works for peace through conflict resolution and nature conservation worldwide, yet with special attention given to Africa.The Brazzaville Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation registered in London where it has been granted charitable status. It draws its authority to act on appeals from States afflicted by internal conflict, those with conflicts on their borders, and through regional or multi-national institutions seeking mediation support. The Foundation is independent, impartial and, in the interest of the peace missions it carries out, rigorously discreet.The Foundations patron is HRH Prince Michael of Kent. I am proud that prominent figures such as Lord Bell of Belgravia or Dr Mathews Phosa have agreed to pool their ideas, contacts and experience in the service of this cause.My other mediations in AfricaSince then, I have never stopped serving as an intermediary to defuse conflicts. In 1989, I undertook mediation in the Comoros to persuade the mercenary Bob Denard, who was once again attempting an overthrow, to leave the archipelago.In 2002, I took part in the talks in Sun City which led to power sharing in the Democratic Republic of the Congo between the president Joseph Kabila and several rebel leaders, including Jean-Pierre Bemba, head of the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo.As the golden rule in these matters is that there is no good deed without discretion, I have waited more than twenty years to reveal the hidden aspects of peace in southern Africa and the end of apartheid. If the success of my current actions depends upon it, I will wait that long again before speaking of them.Fort GroupAt no time have I neglected by business interests, which were instrumental in giving me the capacity to intervene for peace. In the 1980s, I represented major French businesses notably Thomson in Africa. I was on the Board of Directors of CDF-Chimie and Charbonnage de France. From 1984 to 1989, I ran the Coal Trading Corporation (CTC).In 1994, I founded Gestilac SA, then in 2002, PanAfConsultancy GmbH in Zurich and Pan Africa Consulting in Hong-Kong. Today, I have brought all my companies together in a single holding, the Fort Group.I also performed the duties of Advisor in Foreign Trade for France for a number of years.And so, life goes on. At almost 70 years of age, I feel sure that the best is yet to come