SINGAPORE: A billionaire businessman with Singapore citizenship is being investigated by the authorities in Bangladesh on money laundering and other charges related to financial wrongdoings.
The country’s central bank, Bangladesh Bank, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID Bangladesh), the Anti-Corruption Commission, and the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating the 64-year-old Saiful Alam Masud, born in Bangladesh.
He is the chairman and founder of the Bangladeshi industrial conglomerate S.Alam Group, which has more than 200 companies in the food, manufacturing, energy, transportation, real estate, and telecommunications sectors.
According to a report in The Straits Times earlier this week, Mr Alam’s wife, Farzana Parveen, as well as their sons, Ashraful Alam and Ahsanul Alam, are also under investigation in Bangladesh as well, along with known associates of the S.Alam Group. Mr Ahsanul is the subject of a probe for alleged tax evasion.
Earlier this year, an investigation was launched against Mr Alam and his associates on allegations that he had laundered S$12.89 billion overseas, including in Singapore.
He was said to have forged documents and false information when obtaining loans from six Bangladeshi banks. Mr Alam also reportedly used these funds to launch a company in Singapore.
However, lawyers from Wong Partnership, who represents Mr Alam, claim that a smear campaign has been launched against their client, adding that the allegations had come from private media companies in Bangladesh.
“Mr Alam is confident that he has, at all times, conducted his businesses in a proper and legitimate manner in accordance with the laws and regulations of the respective jurisdictions which they operate in,” The Straits Times quotes Mr Alam’s lawyers as saying.
They also called the freezing of the accounts and assets of the S. Alam Group by Bangladeshi authorities “unlawful, arbitrary and discriminatory,” adding that this has affected S. Alam Group’s businesses, some of which may close down in the coming weeks and months. This endangers the jobs of 200,000 workers.
Mr Alam, Ms Farzana, and their two sons were all born in Chittagong, Bangladesh, but came to Singapore in 2009. By 2011, they had become permanent residents; last year, they had obtained Singaporean citizenship.
The family had previously become citizens of Cyprus in 2016 through the investment-for-citizenship Golden Visa programme, reported the investigative journalism group Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.
The featured image of Mr Alam above is from the S.Alam Group website. /TISG