Whatever happened to Arif Naqvi, Abraaj Group?

 LONDON: The father of the ambulance carrier in Karachi and one of the pinnacle players in the personal equity business globally changed into arrested, in case you recollect, again in April of 2019 after his corporation Abraaj had collapsed. He became charged with robbery, conspiracy and a bunch of other things. From that day to this, the media has had best one tale approximately Arif Naqvi.

That story has been told by means of the United States media, most importantly the Wall Street Journal (WSJ). The WSJ journalists have referred to as the Pakistani national “Muslim equal of Bernie Madoff” -- the well-known crook -- paying antique investors in his stockbroker enterprise withproceeds from new traders – died earlier this 12 months in jail. That is in which america government desires to placed Arif Naqvi for nearly 300 years.

Now the other aspect of the argument has been put on this new e book coming from Professor Brian Brivati, an English academic, former professor of Human Rights at Kingston University in London and a representative to the UK authorities and the UN, who has a dozen or so different books below his belt as writer or editor.

Brian fell into this as an educational focused on human rights by coincidence he says and he has instructed the story with proof he discovered. He did interview Naqvi and gave a fair or even-exceeded account.

The book is being defined as “balanced and top notch”. It is balanced and it's miles truthful and most of all it jewelry actual. Abraaj, Brian tells us, become now not a criminal conspiracy and Naqvi is not and changed into now not a criminal. This is a story of geopolitics – Abraaj turned into taken down in what he calls “an monetary hit”. Abraaj did now not self-destruct, it was, in one in every of his few more colorful terms: “murdered” because as he puts it: “These are conspirators who do not conspire.

They have massive conferences and discussions approximately coins glide. These conspirators then throw open their books to multiple investigations wherein all transactions are faithfully recorded. There are fraudsters who do no longer dedicate fraud. A small wide variety of US investors wondered the management of a fund and, in place of assert their personal legal rights, Abraaj returns everybody’s cash with hobby because it fully supposed to hold on working with those investors within the future. There are thieves who do no longer take their complete felony entitlement for profits and carried interest. Thieves who had been so proper at what they do that buyers are still earning profits from their investments nowadays and no cash ever went missing. These racketeers who, in the interim their organisation turned into liquidated, had no longer left a hollowed-out shell but a organisation with assets that were worth more than the claimed liabilities. All operating for an evil genius who used the money he had no longer already given away thru his philanthropy and all his electricity and ingenuity to first try to keep the corporation after which get the creditors paid lower back. The key principal thesis falls down fast. The company changed into a model company citizen and until the cease of 2016 turned into also successful.”

This is the coronary heart of Brivati’s argument. There changed into no conspiracy but rather the organisation changed into taken down through interests within the United States set in opposition to the sale of Karachi Electric to the Chinese and probably additionally people inside the firm who opposed that sale for feeling their days have been numbered and whose allegiances possibly will be wondered.

This is the important thing distinction among all previous bills and this one. The US did now not need K-Electric bought to the Chinese and Trump became operating hand in glove with elements in the US non-public equity enterprise. Abraaj’s new fund become additionally attracting Chinese investment. Opening rising markets to Chinese investment. An anonymous e mail then went to the traders and US traders within the one in every of Abraaj’s funds which turned into devoted to making an investment in healthcare, puzzled using finances. This, like the whole thing else in line with Brivati, became leaked to the click.

Abraaj borrowed to ensure that each one funds were returned to fitness fund buyers via the give up of 2017. They additionally were given an opinion from a main UK regulation firm Freshfields that tested their actions. Furthermore, they had an exercise executed by the big accountants KPMG to verify all of the transactions. Then the equal group of buyers with a US authorities group referred to as OPIC, who had been a lender, asked for further audit at the budget by means of a firm referred to as Ankura – which had very strong links to the USA Department of Justice and Security Exchange Commission which investigates financial crime. The finances had been audited and exceeded by way of some other huge accountancy company Deliottes. This new audit through Ankura became then additionally leaked to the clicking. The new fund was halted and the finances returned on the behest of US investors. Borrowing based on those committed funds turned into then referred to as in by a French bank.

Abraaj turned into liquidated and everything offered off cost effectively. The DOJ secretly opened a report at the on the spot outset of the clicking leaks and ultimately Naqvi and his colleagues had been arrested with out caution or ability to provide an explanation for their movements.