Prime accused Saiful gives confessional statement

Businessman Saiful Haque, a prime accused in a case filed over misappropriation of Tk 165 crore of AB Bank, yesterday gave a confessional statement before a magistrate’s court.

Arrested on last Wednesday, Saiful filed a bail petition but the court rejected his prayer and ordered to send him to jail.

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) arrested Saiful and AB Bank’s former chairman M Wahidul Haque, former head of corporate treasury of the bank Abu Hena Mostafa Kamal from the capital’s Segunbagicha area after filing a case with Motijheel Police Station accusing eight persons including them.

According to the case statement, Saiful introduced his friends and members of international fraud syndicate Khurram Abdullah and Abdus Samad Khan to Wahidul in a bid to launder money from AB Bank.

The syndicate created Pinnacle Global Fund Pte Ltd (PGF), a Singapore-based fundraising and investment company, and opened an account of a company named Cheng Bao General Trading LLC at ADCB Bank, as per the first information report (FIR).

Without informing the Bank’s board, Wahidul, Saiful and Mostafa held several meetings with the syndicate in Dubai.

They also struck a deal, ignoring the instruction of AB Bank’s board, with PGF to invest US $20 million on condition that the firm will give it eight percent interest and invest US $80 million in it within 95 days of getting US $20 million.

Upon the instruction of Wahidul and Mostafa, the OBU unit of AB Bank’s Chittagong EPZ branch released US $5 million on February 10, 2014; US $5 million on February 12, 2014 and US $10 million on February 13, 2014.

Soon after the transfer of the money, the account was closed. “The Singapore-based PGF had been found non-existent since May 12, 2016,” reads the case statement.

ACC’s Assistant Director Gulshan Anowar Pradhan, complainant of the case, said “Saiful confessed that he was involved in the misappropriation.”