Crime

Former Beige Bank CEO  in court slapped with  44 counts

A former Chief Executive Officer of Beige Bank Limited, Michael Henaku, has been charged with 44 counts of money laundering, fraudulentbreach of trust and stealing depositors’ money.

He is expected to appear before the Financial and Economic Crime Division of the High Court in Accra to answer the various charges, according to a suit filed by theAttorney General’s Office on November 2, this year. 

The suit, signed by Yvonne Atakora Obuobisa, Director of Public Prosecution, said the alleged malfeasance was discovered after the Bank of Ghana (BoG) had revoked the banking licence of Henaku and placed the Bank in receivership.

The Bank’s licence was revoked by BoG on August 1, 2018.

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The suit said a review of the financial and other records of the Bank conducted by the Receiver identified a number of suspicious and unusual transactions.

The unusual transactions were subsequently reported to the law enforcement agencies for investigations and same revealed that between 2015 and 2018, Henaku, who was then the CEO of Beige Bank had allegedly used various means to transfer huge sums of money to companies related to him and for his personal benefit.

It said the funds transferred were depositors funds lodged with the Bank.

Also, the suit said between 2017 and 2018, the accused had caused the transfer of 10,071 fixed deposit accounts held by Beige Bank in, which various customers

had placed a total of GH¢448,636,210, to Beige Capital Asset Management Limited (BCAM) without the knowledge and consent of the customers.

Meanwhile, BCAM was a limited liability company wholly owned by The Beige Group Limited (Beige Group), an entity wholly owned by the accused, according to the suit. 

Again, investigations revealed that the accused between 2017 and 2018, had caused the transfer of 35 fixed deposit investments of 23 customers of Beige Bank totaling GH¢ 141,042,348 to the Beige Group, a company owned by the accused, the majority shareholder of the Beige Bank.

Investigations also revealed that sometime in March 2018, the accused had caused a “fictitious” second account to be opened in the name of First Africa Savings and Loans (FASL) on an existing account holder with Beige Bank without the knowledge of the board and management of FASL.

The suit alleged the accused then caused the transfer of the sum of GH¢320 million from the accounts of various Beige Bank customers into the account of BCAM held with Beige Bank.

It said the GH¢320 million was subsequently transferred from BCAM account held at Beige Bank into the “fictitious” FASL account that had been opened in Beige Bank books on the instructions of the accused person allegedly.

Between March 2018 and August 2018, the suit said GH¢21, 123,270.96 out of the GH¢ 320 million was transferred from the said “fictitious” FASL bank account totwo individuals and 10 companies, nine of which were related to the accused, on the instructions of the accused. – GNA

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