Lakah is not owner of the newspaper:
France Soir sale deadline extended
By Pierre Tran in Paris
08 January 2006
http://www.thebusinessonline.com
ADMINISTRATORS running France Soir have won an extension to 12 January to flush out last-minute buyers for the tabloid daily which went into bankruptcy protection at the end of October.
The initial deadline closed at the end of December, with three bidders hoping to acquire the title.
Two have made previous approaches to the paper, whose proprietor, Franco-Egyptian businessman Raymond Lakah, has thrown in the towel after years of heavy losses.
Georges Ghosn bought the title in 1999 for a symbolic one franc from the Socpresse group, only to resell it a year later to the Italian company Poligrafici Editoriale.
Property developer Jean-Pierre Brunois, chairman of the Financière Hoche firm put in a bid in 2004 but failed to show up at the board meeting that would have sealed the deal.
Apparently, opposition from journalists at the paper put Brunois off, but he has come back with a second offer, this time teamed up with a sports journalist, Olivier Rey.
The third bidder is Vincent Lalu, who owns the specialist title La Vie du Rail, a weekly rail magazine.
The administrators hope that two more bidders will appear for the title, which will run out of cash at the end of January.
Belgian magazine publisher Dominique Van Lier and an unidentified media hopeful are said to be putting final touches to a bid.