Defendants at the court. (Source: VNA)HCM City (VNA) – Pham Cong Danh,ex-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Vietnam Construction Bank (VNCB, presentname CB), said before court that all the money involved in the case of“deliberately violating State regulations on economic management causing severeconsequences” in VNCB was used to serve the bank’s operation, not personalpurposes.
In his last statement at the second-phase trial ofthe case in Ho Chi Minh City on February 1, Danh, who was also Chairman of theBoard of Members and General Director of Thien Thanh Group, asked the judgingcouncil to look into and make clear how the money was spent.
Danh said during the three-year restructuring ofVNCB from 2012-2014, he mobilised a large amount of money to maintain thebank’s liquidity and improve its services. He added that he even poured all thecapital of Thien Thanh Group, which was operated by his family over the past 50years, into the bank.
For his part, Tram Be, former Vice Chairman ofSacombank, said he did not deliberately violate the regulations, appealing tothe judge to reduce the proposed jail sentence of five years.
Both Danh and Be apologized to their families andcolleagues for getting them involved them in the case.
44 other defendants also asked for clemency from thejudge.
According to the indictment, in2013 and 2014, Danh asked staffs of the VNCB and Thien Thanh Group to compilefalse documents in the names of 29 companies which were established in Danh’sname or others, in order to take loans from Saigon Thuong Tin Commercial JointStock Bank (Sacombank), Tien Phong (TPBank) and Bank for Investment andDevelopment of Vietnam (BIDV).
Danh used the money for personalpurposes and was unable to refund. He and his accomplices also used VNCB’smoney as collateral for loans from the banks. Their wrongdoings caused economiclosses of more than 6.1 trillion VND (268.4 million USD) to the VNCB.
On January 22, the municipalPeople’s Procuracy proposed a 30-year imprisonment sentence to Danh, Mai andKhuong, and a jail sentence of 5-6 years to Tram Be.
Other defendants will face atwo-year suspended sentence to 23 years in prison.
The trial is scheduled toconclude on February 7.
VNA
