The first
prosecution witness in the criminal case against the former Chief Executive
Officer (CEO) and owner of the defunct Beige Bank, Mike Nyinaku, has alleged
that the bank was turned into a ‘cash cow for the accused where customer funds
were siphoned at his will.
Julius Ayivor, a
chartered accountant said the withdrawals were done at the beck and call of
Nyinaku himself and his many companies, including The Beige Group Limited.
The proceedings
of the High Court held at the last sitting on April 3 was largely centred on
one of the prosecution’s case involving a total of GH¢141 million that was
allegedly siphoned out of the accounts of 23 customers of the defunct Beige
Bank on the instructions of the former CEO.
The funds were
allegedly siphoned to The Beige Group Limited, a company wholly owned by the
accused person.
Evidence [[ FREE COURSE:
Two customers,
Tobinco Pharmaceuticals Limited and Ernest & Barbs Construction Limited,
were cited in Mr Ayivor’s witness statement, as examples of the 23 affected
customers.
The first
prosecution witness used the case of Tobinco and Ernest & Barbs to explain
to the court how the alleged siphoning was done on the accused person’s
instructions.
In the case of
Ernest & Barbs, the witness alleged the siphoning of GH¢17 million from
Ernest & Barbs’ account in January 2018 while an amount of GH¢20 million
was siphoned from Tobinco’s account in March 2018, all to the benefit of the
accused person and his company, The Beige Group Limited.
Cross-examination [[GROW YOUR ONLINE BUSINESS WITH THIS POWERFUL PLATFORM ]]
During
cross-examination of the witness, the counsel for Mike Nyinaku, Thaddeus Sory,
suggested that the evidence provided by the prosecution indicated that
customers whose funds were allegedly siphoned from their accounts knew that
their funds were being transferred to The Beige Group Limited and also indeed
sanctioned the transfers.
Mr Sory asked:
“As the Receiver who investigated, did you find out if those customers were
specifically targeted or there was a special reason why their deposits were a
subject of the transfers to The Beige Group Limited?”
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In a rebuttal,
Mr Sory said: “I am putting it to you that the only reason why these customers
had their funds transferred to The Beige Group Limited is because they
sanctioned those transfers.”
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Mr Ayivor
vehemently disagreed with that suggestion, describing it as a blatant untruth.
“First of all,
The Beige Group Limited, which is a company limited by liability, is not
licensed to take deposits, neither is it licensed to operate the business of
banking and fund management.
“So, there is no
way that any of the affected customers would have sanctioned the siphoning of
their funds to The Beige Group Limited. The Beige Group Limited is just a
holding company with the responsibility of supervising companies owned by the
accused person,” he said.
The chartered
accountant further explained that The Beige Group Limited had no power and
authority to take deposits.
Mr Sory then
asked the witness if he was aware that The Beige Group Limited sourced funds
from various sources, including the Beige Bank and from its business, to
support the bank’s payment of interest to those customers to which the witness
said he was not aware.
“All I know is
that The Beige Group Limited, under the supervision of Mike Nyinaku, turned the
bank into a cash cow where funds placed by customers were siphoned to The Beige
Group Limited and to the accused person at will.”
Account statement
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The counsel for the accused later cited a few instances in the bank account statement of The Beige Group Limited, which had been tendered in evidence, and cited a few instances in which funds were being paid out to some of the affected customers, including Tobinco and Ernest & Barbs.
Mr Sory, for instance, drew the court’s attention to two transfers of
GH¢473,000 each, made from the account of The Beige Group and described as
“funds transfer from BG to Tobinco Pharmaceuticals Ltd”.
The counsel, who
also tendered through the witness, copies of cheques issued by The Beige Group
Limited to Ernest & Barbs and signed by Mike Nyinaku, which cheques cleared
on the account of The Beige Group, put it to the witness: “I am putting it to
you that your testimony confirms clearly that Tobinco and Ernest & Barbs
received payments directly from the Beige Group account, all of which payments
represent interest on their investment, which confirm that the customers knew
they were dealing with the Beige Group”.
The witness vehemently
disagreed with that suggestion, saying: “My Lady, that is not true, and it can
never be true. As I stated earlier, all the transfers involving the 23 affected
customers were done without their knowledge and express instructions.”
The witness had
stated in his witness statement and at the beginning of the cross-examination
that The Beige Group Limited was not a licensed financial institution, as such,
any suggestion that it (The Beige Group Limited) made interest payments to any
of the affected customers could not be true.
Background
Mike Nyinaku was
the former Chief Executive Officer of The Beige Bank Limited and on 1 August
2018, Bank of Ghana revoked the banking license of Beige Bank and placed it in
receivership. Mike Nyinaku is standing trial on forty-three (43) counts of
stealing, fraudulent breach of trust and money laundering, involving the
siphoning of a total of GH¢1.2 billion from the defunct Beige Bank between 2015
and 2018, in a case presided over by Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe, a Justice
of the Court of Appeal sitting with additional responsibilities as a High Court
Judge. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
The case has
been adjourned to 17 April 2023 at 10am to be held at Financial Court 2 of the
High Court
SOURCE: CITINEWSROOM.COM
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