Hanoi:
A high-profile Vietnamese real estate tycoon was sentenced to death on Thursday in one of the largest corruption cases in history, with losses estimated at $27 billion.
Truong My Lan, chairman of major developer Van Thinh Phat, was found guilty of embezzling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade, in a case that shocked the country.
Eighty-five others, including Lan’s husband, niece and several Standard Chartered Bank executives, were also sentenced at a court in the southern commercial hub of Ho Chi Minh City.
Who is Zhang Meilan?
According to state media, Lan was born in Ho Chi Minh City in 1956. Her mother was a marketer who sold cosmetics.
She founded Van Thinh Phat in 1992, which subsequently acquired high-end hotels, restaurants and luxury apartments and invested in financial services. Many of its real estate projects are located in prime locations in the heart of Ho Chi Minh City.
Investigators said there are more than 1,000 companies in the “Van Thinh Phat” ecosystem, including a group of “ghost companies” and overseas interest networks.
According to state media reports, Lan met her husband, Eric Chu Nap Kee, in the early 1990s when he was looking for investment opportunities. The Hong Kong billionaire was sentenced to nine years in prison on Thursday.
Why did she steal so many things?
Lan was found guilty on three counts: bribery, breach of bank regulations and corruption.
Between 2012 and 2022, she stole $12.5 billion from Standard Chartered Bank by setting up false loan applications to withdraw funds from the bank, in which she owned 90% of the shares.
The court judge said she ordered Standard Chartered Bank officials to transfer the money to shell companies, which were then transferred or withdrawn in cash to cover up her wrongdoing, state media reported.
Between February 2019 and September 2022, her drivers transported the equivalent of more than $4.4 billion in cash from the headquarters of Standard Chartered Bank in Ho Chi Minh City to her nearby home and the headquarters in Van Thinh Phat.
The judges said she also took advantage of the government’s plan to restructure Standard Chartered Bank, using the bank as a cash cow after merging with two banks.
Police have identified more than 40,000 fraud victims who were Standard Chartered bondholders.
Former employees of the State Bank of Vietnam (the central bank) were paid millions of dollars in bribes to cover up Standard Chartered Bank’s misconduct and poor financial performance.
Do Thi Nhan, the former head of the central bank’s inspection team, was sentenced to life in prison for accepting $5.2 million in cash in three Styrofoam boxes.
How did she get exposed?
Lan and others were arrested as part of China’s “furnace” anti-corruption campaign, which swept away scores of corrupt officials and China’s business elite.
The sweep, driven by powerful Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, has seen more than 4,400 people prosecuted in more than 1,700 corruption cases since 2021.
But the scale of Thursday’s trial is unprecedented. The evidence was packed in 104 boxes with a total weight of 6 tons and involved 200 defense lawyers.
Cameras inside the courtroom – which is not always allowed in Vietnam – showed Lan fidgeting and looking anxious before the verdict, while many of her co-defendants sat with their heads lowered.
However, the anti-corruption drive has dealt a blow to Vietnam’s economy, and analysts say some foreign investors are scared, although they have generally praised the campaign’s goals of improving the rule of law.
Nguyen Phu Trong is still pressing for a faster crackdown.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
