Defendant Nguyen Thanh Tai, former Vice Chairman of the HCM City People’s Committee, at the trial (Photo: VNA) HCMCity (VNA) – Nguyen Thanh Tai,former Vice Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee, and four accomplices involved in the case “violating regulations on the management and use of State assets,causing losses and wastefulness” have filed an appeal against the judgments which were announced at the first instance trial.
At the first trial on September 20, Tai wassentenced to eight years in prison for “violating regulations onthe management and use of State assets, causing losses and wastefulness”.
According to thejury, the land plot at No. 8-12 Le Duan Street in District 1, covering a totalarea of over 4,800 sq. m., is owned by the State and assigned to the HCM CityHousing Management and Trading Company for management and leased out to fourcompanies subordinate to the Ministry of Industry and Trade. On November 20,2007, the municipal People’s Committee approved the construction of a hotel andpart of a commercial centre there.
The HCM City Housing Management and Trading Company, with thecurrently wanted Nguyen Thi Thu Thuy being the director, proposed the municipalPeople’s Committee permit it to set up a new legal entity in the form of ajoint stock company and to mobilise other capital sources to implement theproject. This proposal was accepted by Tai as a Vice Chairman of the municipal People's Committee.
Taking advantage of her personal relationship with Tai, LeThi Thanh Thuy, who was then Chairwoman of the Hoa Thang Nam One-Member LimitedCompany, suggested the HCM City Housing Management and Trading Company allowher business to take part in this project.
After that, Nguyen Thi Thu Thuy signed a document introducingthe Hoa Thang Nam company to the project, which was approved by Tai withoutassigning a specialised agency to verify this firm’s experience and financialcapacity.
The four companies under the Ministry of Industry and Trade,which were renting land at the plot, agreed with the Kinh Do Investment Co. Ltdto establish a new legal entity which was the Lavenue Investment JSC and let LeThi Thanh Thuy act as Chairwoman of its board of directors.
Later, those companies transferred their shares, putting theland plot into private ownership, thus causing a loss of over 1.927 trillionVND (83.1 million USD at the current exchange rate) to the State.
The jury concluded that Le Thi Thanh Thuy incited Tai so asto profit from the documents signed by him. Meanwhile, Dao Anh Kiet (formerDirector of the municipal Department of Natural Resources and Environment),Nguyen Hoai Nam (former Secretary of the Party Committee of District 2), andTruong Van Ut (former deputy head of the land management section at theDepartment of Natural Resources and Environment) knew that the project’sdossier was insufficient and hadn’t been approved or verified but still proposedthe approval of decisions that ran counter to legal regulations.
At the trial, Le Thi Thanh Thuy was given a five-year jailterm, Kiet five years (total penalty is 11 years and six months, including thesentence in a previous case), Nam four years, and Ut three years (total penaltyis eight years, including the sentence in a previous case) also for “violatingregulations on the management and use of State assets, causing losses and wastefulness”.
Besides, the jury assigned the HCM City People’s Committee torevoke all the land use right certificates and other papers related to the landplot previously granted to the Lavenue company.
It also decided that the five defendants have to compensateover 4.7 billion VND for the loss. The money the Hoa Thang Nam company used tomake capital contribution to the Lavenue company will also be confiscated.
Previously, on October 2, the Head of the municipal People's Procuracy appealed against the first instance judgment on the handling of evidence and thelosses in the case.
According to the Procuracy, the first-instance judgment’sdeclaration to withdraw only 126out of 157 billion VND as the contributed capital of the HCM City Housing Management and TradingCompany, still causes a loss of over 30 billion VND tothe State budget.
In addition, the Procuracy said thelosses must be determined at the time of prosecution of over 1.92 trillion VND inline with the indictment of the Supreme People's Procuracy, not over 252billion VND. The fact that the Court calculates the losses at the time ofcommitting the crime did not determine the nature of the case./.
VNA
