Umed-88, one of Tajikistan’s largest gas retailers, is reportedly ready to repay the received loan with interest.
“Umed-88 management is ready to pay back the received 171 million somoni loan to the government fully with interest,” company’s defense lawyer, Abubakr Qulmatov, told Asia-Plus in an interview.
According to him, the company top managers could fully repay the loan with interest by selling the company and their own properties.
“To-date, only the Umed-88 owner Rajabali Odinayev and the company director Idibek Ibrohimov have been detained and criminal proceedings have been instituted against them under the provisions of two articles of Tajikistan’s Penal Code: Article 246 (3) – large scale loan embezzlement; and Article 295 (2) – abuse of office entailing serious circumstances,” Qulmatov noted.
The lawyer denied reports by some media outlets that his clients allegedly face charges of contraband and illegal loan receipt as unfounded.
He also noted that before the arrest of Odinayev and Ibrohimov the company had repaid more than 33 million somoni to the Ministry of Finance.
“Today, the company is ready to provide more than 3.5 million somoni worth of gasoline for construction of the Roghun hydroelectric power plant (HPP),” the lawyer said.
“Rajabali Odinayev, his colleagues and relatives have repeatedly stated that they are ready to fully pay back the loan with interest for exchange of releasing them [Odinayev and Ibrohimov] on their own recognizance,” Qulmatov noted.
The lawyer also said that Tajikistan’s High economic Court in June last year assessed Ued-88’s assets at more than 173 million somoni and seized them following the request by the Ministry of Finance. “After the seizure of the company’s properties they might not have arrested the company managers,” Qulmatov noted.
Recall, things started looking grim for the company after President Emomali Rahmon harshly criticized Umed-88 owner Rajabali Odinayev during a meeting with local businesspeople in Dushanbe on October 14.
The president, in particular, noted that Umed-88 had some years ago received a 170 million somoni loan at 18 percent interest with facilitation from the Ministry of Finance, but that the company had failed to pay the money back. “Sixty million somoni of this money have gone to paying off debts to Tojik Sodirot Bonk (TSB), and 25 million has gone to Amonatbonk. The rest he [Odinayev] just spent for his own needs. He should answer before the law. Government money is the money of the people,” Emomali Rahmon said.
After president’s criticism directed at the founder of gas retailer Umed-88, workers started to take down Umed-88 signs across the country. The company’s head office in Dushanbe has been closed.
Ten days later, the anticorruption agency said that Rajabali Odinayev and Umed-88 director Idibek Ibrohimov top managers of Umed-88 had been arrested. Odinayev and Ibrohimov were detained on October 14 right after the president harshly criticized the company.
According to information posted on the website of the Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption, Open Joint-Stock Company (OJSC) NBO Roghun, Ministry of Finance and Umed-88 LLC on May 15, 2015 signed a trilateral loan agreement, under which OJSC NBO Roghun acted as creditor and the Ministry of Finance and Umed-88 LLC acted as borrowers (Most likely, the Ministry of Finance acted as guarantor – Asia-Plus).
The document provided for granting a 171 million somoni loan to Umed-88 LLC for enhancement of the country’s agrarian-and-industrial complex by means of providing farming units with diesel fuel. The borrowers should have repaid the loan not later than December 31, 2015.
According to the anticorruption agency, Umed-88 top managers received a large state loan illegally. Umed-88 director Idibek Ibrohimov, the gas retailer owner Rajabali Odinayev and other top managers of the company are charged with untargeted use of the loan. In May-June 2015, they reportedly used 74 million somoni of the loan to repay the company’s debts to Amonatbonk (Tajikistan’s savings bank) and Tojik Sodirot Bonk (TSB).
