According to Mike Nyinaku, the first witness for the prosecution in the criminal case against the former CEO and owner of the defunct Beige Bank, 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.
At its most recent session on April 3, the High Court’s proceedings were mostly focused on one of the prosecution’s cases involving a total of GH141 million that was allegedly taken from the accounts of 23 customers of the now-defunct Beige Bank on the former CEO’s orders.
The Beige Group Ltd, which is wholly owned by the accused, is where the money allegedly was diverted.
Evidence
In his witness statement, Mr. Ayivor named two customers as examples of the 23 customers who were impacted: Tobinco Pharmaceuticals Limited and Ernest & Barbs Construction Limited.
The first witness for the prosecution used the case of Tobinco and Ernest & Barbs to demonstrate to the court how the alleged siphoning was carried out per the accused’s orders.
In the instance of Ernest & Barbs, the witness said that GH17 million was fraudulently taken out of the company’s account in January 2018, while GH20 million was taken out of Tobinco’s account in March 2018. Both transactions allegedly benefited the accused and his business, The Beige Group Ltd.
Cross-examination
During cross-examination of the witness, Thaddeus Sory, the counsel for Mike Nyinaku, asserted that the prosecution’s evidence showed that the consumers whose money was allegedly stolen from their accounts were aware of and authorized the transactions to The Beige Group Ltd.
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?”
In response, Mr Ayivor said: “I do not know if they [the affected customers] were specifically targeted or whether there was a special reason that necessitated the siphoning of their funds. What is apparent from the grand scheme that was perpetrated by the accused person is that once he noted that the customers had a lot of funds in their account, that became an opportunity for the accused person to oversee the siphoning of those funds to himself and his companies”.
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.”
Mr. Ayivor fiercely refuted such assertion, calling it blatantly untrue.
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“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 went on to say that The Beige Group Limited lacked the legal right and capacity to accept 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
Later, the counsel for the accused cited a few instances in the bank account statement of The Beige Group Limited, which had been presented as evidence, and mentioned a few instances in which money was being paid to some of the customers who were impacted, 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: Myjoyonline
