The Anti-Corruption Commission on Tuesday received a dummy cheque of Tk70.4m, which was recovered from the money that was laundered to Singapore by former prime minister Khaleda Zia’s son Arafat Rahman Koko.
Attorney General Mahbubey Alam handed over the cheque to the commission Chairman M Bodiuzzaman at a city hotel yesterday.
The commission received the money on August 13, in a dummy cheque which was issued from United Overseas Bank of Singapore that said US $956,387.40 is given to the Stolen Asset Recovery Account of Anti-Corruption Commission.
The money is the second instalment of the recovered money. ACC on November 22 received the first instalment of Tk130.4m, which was also laundered by Koko to Singapore.
On January 3, the commission received Tk1.5m as interest on the Singapore $2.04m laundered by Koko and recovered by the commission.
The money was given to the commission at the closing ceremony of a two-day training programme on asset recovery, organised by the ACC at a city hotel.
Regarding the recovery of Koko’s money, Attorney General Mahbubey Alam said following some clues, the department of justice at USA went to Singapore and found an account where some unusual transaction was going on.
“The authority then arrested the account holder, who confirmed that the money belonged to Arafat Rahman Koko, so the person was convicted. Later we requested the authorities in Singapore to give us information, and following the information, a case was filed. A Dhaka court has convicted Koko for laundering money,” the attorney general said.
“Later, following a Mutual Legal Assistance Request, the Singapore authority gave us the money since the money was entitled to the state,” Alam said.
The commission filed a case against Arafat Rahman Koko on March 17, 2009 on charge of money laundering which he had illegally obtained from a German company, Siemens, and other sources, in exchange for helping them get government contracts.
Arafat had a deal with China Harbour Engineering Company Ltd in a Tk3.51bn contract for construction of the New Mooring Container Terminal and with Siemens in a Tk2.39bn contract for the supply and installation of equipment for the state-run mobile operator Teletalk.
A few other people also gave money to Arafat that was deposited in two of his five bank accounts in Singapore detected by the commission. Four of the accounts are with United Overseas Bank and the fifth with the CIC Bank.
The attorney general in his speech also said the money laundering cases would be conducted by the court following the Money Laundering Prevention Act 2009, but punishments would be declared as per the Money Laundering Prevention Act 2012.
The attorney general also put emphasis on the need of efficient lawyers to fight at court in corruption cases.
“Assets cannot be recovered without conviction, and for conviction, we need efficient lawyers.”
The attorney general told reporters that many other politicians were also involved with the money laundering. “There is laundered money in Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, London and many other countries, but the money cannot be recovered until cases are filed in these connections. A country will only return us the laundered money when a judgment is given in a case.”
Law Minister Shafique Ahmed said that recovering laundered money was not an easy task and there was every possibility that the case would be frustrated.
“If lawyers are not serious over their duties, there will be chance of delay in the cases. Be strict in choosing lawyers, because lawyers are responsible for delay in cases, which ultimately takes 4-5 years for disposal of such cases,” the minister said.
Shafique also said amendments on criminal procedure and civil procedure were on the way to lessen the procrastination of the judicial process.
ACC Chairman M Badiuzaman and Secretary Faizur Rahman Chowdhury also spoke at the programme.