Former CEO of Beige Bank to parade 61 witnesses to mount defence to charges

The former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the defunct Beige Bank Limited Michael Nyinaku has told a High Court in Accra that he will be calling 61 witnesses to mount his defence to over 40 charges.

Mr Nyinaku has been ordered by the Court to open his defense after the prosecution closed its case after calling five witnesses.

The founder of the defunct bank has been charged with stealing, fraudulent breach of trust and money laundering and pleaded not guilty to all the charges.

In court on Monday, March 4, his lawyers led by Thaddeus Sory, told the court, presided over by Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe, Justice of the Court of Appeal, that they have so far filed a list of the 61 witnesses they intend to call.

The Court has since directed them to file the first of the 15 out of the 61 in order of which they would be testifying.

The case has been adjourned to March 13, 2024.

Brief facts

Per the brief facts of the case narrated by Alfred Tuah-Yeboah, Deputy Attorney General, Mr Nyinaku was the former Chief Executive Officer of Beige Bank and that on August 1, 2018, the Bank of Ghana (BoG) revoked the banking license of Beige Bank and placed it in receivership.

He said a review of the financial and other records of the Bank conducted by the receiver and his team showed several suspicious and unusual transactions, which were subsequently reported to the law enforcement agencies for investigations.

The AG said investigations conducted revealed that between 2015 and 2018, the accused person as CEO of the bank, had allegedly used various means to transfer huge sums of monies to companies related to him and for his personal benefits.

He alleged that the funds transferred were depositors’ funds lodged with the Beige Bank and that between 2017 and 2018, Nyinaku had caused the transfer of GHC10,071.00 fixed deposit account held with Beige Bank in which various customers placed a total of GHC448,636,210.21 to Beige Capital Asset Management Limited, (BCAM), without the knowledge and consent of the customers.

Plot

The AG said BCAM was a limited liability company wholly owned by the Beige Group Limited (Beige Group), an entity which in turn was wholly owned by the accused person, adding that the accused person between 2017 and 2018 caused the transfer of 35 fixed deposit investments of 23 customers of Beige Bank valued at GHC141,042,348.92 to the Beige Group, a Company wholly owned by the accused person and its majority shareholders of Beige Bank.

The prosecution said further investigations revealed that in March 2018, the accused person had caused a “fictitious” second account to be opened in the name of First African Savings and Loans (FASL), an existing account holder with Beige Bank, without the knowledge of the board and management of FASL.

The AG said the accused person then caused the transfer of the sum of GHC320 million from the accounts of various Beige Bank customers into the bank accounts of BCAM held with Beige Bank.

The GHC320 million was subsequently transferred from the BCAM account held with the Beige Bank into the “fictitious” FASL account that had been opened in Beige Bank’s books on the instructions of the accused person allegedly, said the prosecution.

It said between March 2018 and August 2018, GHC21,123,270.96 out of the GHC320 million was transferred from the “fictitious” FASL bank account to some two individuals and ten companies, nine of which were related to Nyinaku, on his instructions.

Email transactions

The AG said again, between 2015 and 2017, the accused person, through the use of payment vouchers, had caused the sum of GHc1,465,000.00 of depositors’ funds lodged with Beige Bank to be paid to himself and other persons, the court heard.

It said the transactions were recorded in a general ledger account of the bank described as Directors’ account, adding that it came out that the accused person through the use of payment vouchers, emails and memos, had caused a total of GHC20,599,052.58 of depositors’ funds lodged with Beige Bank to be transferred to a number of a general ledger account of the bank described as shareholders’ account.

The AG also said, between 2016 and 2017, the accused, through the use of payment vouchers, had caused a total amount of GHC141,742,087.70 of depositors’ funds lodged with Beige Bank to be transferred to a number of companies and individuals for his benefits allegedly, it said.

It said the transactions were recorded in the general ledger account of the Bank described as Prepayment- a Project Work Account, and that between 2017 and 2018, the accused person using payment vouchers, e-mails, and memo’s had further caused the sum of GHC118,076,813.09 of depositors’ funds lodged with Beige Bank to be transferred to several companies and individuals for his benefit, allegedly.

It said the transactions were also recorded in a general ledger account of the bank described as Beige Group Account.

The AG again said investigations had established that the money the accused allegedly dishonestly appropriated from the Beige Bank remained unpaid as of August 1, 2018, when the Bank’s license was revoked by BoG.