Beige Bank case: Nyinaku did not benefit from GH¢250k transferred to Beige Foundation - 7th defense witness

The founder of the defunct Beige Bank, Michael Nyinaku, who has been charged with allegedly stealing customer funds, "did not benefit from any" of the GH¢250,000 transactions transferred to the Beige Foundation, the High Court has been informed.

State Prosecutors, as part of their 43 counts of charges against Mr. Michael Nyinaku, have accused him, among other things, of stealing GH¢250,000 transferred from First African Savings and Loans (FASL) to the Beige Foundation.

However, Akosua Koranteng Adayi, the former Director for the Beige Foundation, who joined The Beige Group in 2017, stated, "the accused did not benefit from any of the transactions."

In her witness statement, which was adopted by the Financial and Economic Division of the High Court in Accra on Monday, May 27, the witness asserted, "there was no payment made to the accused."

Testifying as the 7th Defense Witness in the ongoing trial, the witness, who was a lecturer at Zenith University College and later rose to the positions of Dean of Student Affairs and Head of the Institution, said, "per documents available, there can be no doubt whatsoever that the funds transferred to the Academy were used by the Academy itself."

"From the evidence I have provided by way of the documents I have attached hereto and marked AKA 5 and AKA 6, there can be no doubt whatsoever that the funds transferred to the Academy were used by the Academy itself.

"The manner in which the funds were used, their purposes, and the payees are quite clear from the bank statement.

"There was no payment made to the accused person.

"To the best of my knowledge, therefore, the accused did not benefit from any of the transactions," she told the court presided over by Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe, a Justice of the Court of Appeal.

Nyinaku, the founder and Chief Executive Officer of the defunct bank, has been charged with allegedly stealing GH¢2.1 billion of depositors' money from the bank.

He has since pleaded not guilty to 43 charges, including stealing, fraudulent breach of trust, and money laundering, and has been granted bail.

Transfer of GH¢250k to Academy

The witness further testified that she was familiar with the transfer of GH¢250k and all the transactional documents from FASL to the Foundation and the Academy.

"As stated earlier, funds for the operations of the Academy come from subventions received from all the affiliates, including TBG, as well as revenue arising from bills issued for services rendered by the staff/trainees that are outsourced by the Academy to the affiliates."

Koranteng Adayi said, "There were several occasions where subventions from the affiliates and payments for services rendered by the academy may either be delayed or would be in arrears."

"And when these situations occurred, they put a strain on the academy's liquidity, and when the academy faced a liquidity difficulty, it relied on TBG for working capital support."

The witness explained to the court that "requests for funds were made for specific purposes and they usually would be in the form of emails."

She said, "Examples of such emails are attached and marked as exhibit AKA 4, by which the Academy was requesting funds to meet its budget for the month of March 2018.

"The amount of GH¢250,000 that the Academy received was one such occasion when the Academy needed funds to support its operations as its usual sources of income were in arrears," she said.

"The liquidity situation that the Academy was facing at the time is further explained in paragraphs 21 to 32."

The witness said, "Having been credited with the amount of GH¢250,000, the Academy used it to finance its routine operations.

"I have attached to my present statement a report which shows how these funds, as received, were utilized by the Academy.

"This report is marked AKA 5 and is a summary of information relating to how Beige Academy used the GH¢250,000.00 it received from TBG for its operational activities," she indicated.