Two Lebanese nationals who allegedly attempted to defraud one of the leading banks in the country of GH¢6,640,000 have been arrested by the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service. The suspects are Najib Arnaout, the Managing Director of Badza Company Limited, based in Accra, and Ahmed Ali Ibrahim, the Managing Director of Rah- Traco Company, which exports charcoal from Ghana to Lebanon. According to sources; if the deal had not been detected, it would have collapsed the bank. The Director-General of the CID, Mr. Prosper Agblor, told the Daily Graphic that sometime in September last year, the two conspired to defraud the bank by forging internal debit vouchers in the name of three corporate customers under the pretext that the said customers were paying them contract fees to the tune of GH¢6,640,000. He said the account of Badza Cpmpany Limited was subsequently credited with the said amount, but prior to that the suspects had opened accounts with four other banks operating in the country for the deal. Mr. Agblor said the two then instructed the bank to transfer the money into the four banks, whose names are being withheld. He said GH¢6,640,000, was paid into the first bank, while GH¢1,000,000 was paid to the second bank, with GH¢4,000,000 being paid into the two other banks. He said on the same day, October 1, 2010, that the monies were transferred into the accounts at the four other banks, the two suspects successfully withdrew GH¢15,200 from one of the banks. The Director-General said when the first deal went through, the two decided to withdraw all the deposits from the other three banks. Najib duly entered the bank to withdraw GH¢3,000,000, but since the amount was too huge, the bank asked him to wait while it cross-checked the transaction. He said when Najib realised that the deal would be uncovered, he attempted to sneak out of the bank, but he was quickly arrested by security men who handed him over to the Police. Mr. Agblor indicated that before Ali could go to the other bank to withdraw money, he got wind of Najib’s arrest and so he drove straight to the Kotoka International Airport, and flew out to Lebanon. He said Ali was using a rented car which he abandoned at the airport before travelling and the car was later retrieved by the Police. He said the Police then launched full-scale investigations into the issue and realised that the two were fraudsters. The Director-General said the Police took the necessary steps to arrest Ali by circulating information on him through INTERPOL and other local security agencies at the various exit and entry points of the country. He said luck eluded Ali seven months after hiding from the Police when he attempted to re-enter the country through Lome on May 31, 2011. Unknown to him, the Police had been hinted and set up ambush at the Aflao Border and he was arrested as soon-as -he passed through Immigration. Source: Daily Graphic