By Beatrice Oppon
Former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of defunct Beige Bank, Michael Nyinaku has pleaded not guilty to 43 charges of stealing, fraudulent breach of trust and money laundering.
The Accra High Court has admitted him to bail in the sum of 200 million cedis with three sureties, two of which should be justified with a landed property valued by the Architectural and Engineering Services Limited or the Land Valuation Division.
The sureties can also deposit government bonds to the value of the bail bond.
Mr Nyinaku has also been ordered to deposit his passport with the Registrar of the court and report to the police every Monday and Friday.
The Judge, Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe also ordered the prosecution led by a Deputy Attorney General Alfred Tuah-Yeboah to file disclosures by December 9, 2022 and adjourned to December 22 for Case Management Conference.
Mr Nyinaku has been accused of stealing 1.2 billion cedis belonging to customers of the defunct bank.
According to the facts presented in Court between 2017 and 2018, the accused person caused the transfer of ten thousand and seventeen fixed deposit accounts with more than 448 million cedis belonging to various customers made to Beige Capital Asset without the knowledge and consent of the customers.
Mr Tuah-Yeboah said the alleged acts were discovered following investigations into the bank after its license was revoked and placed under receivership by the Bank of Ghana.
He said it was also discovered that between 2017 and 2018 the accused also allegedly caused the transfer of 35 fixed investments of 23 customers of Beige Bank amounting to more than 141 million cedis to Beige Group which is wholly owned by him and also a majority shareholder of Beige Bank.
The Deputy Attorney General also stated that sometime in March 2018, Mr Nyinaku also caused a fictitious second account to be opened in the name of First Africa Savings and Loans which is an existing account holder with Beige Bank without the knowledge of the Board and management of the Savings and Loans company.
The accused was represented by Addo Atuah.
Speaking to journalists after the Court proceedings, the Deputy Attorney General said the State will use all legal means to recover monies used to settle customers of the collapsed financial institutions.