Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) has found that Saifuzzaman Chowdhury, the former Land Minister of Bangladesh, spent over $500 million on opulent real estate in London, Dubai, and New York, but failed to disclose these foreign holdings on his tax filings from Bangladesh.
The 55-year-old Chowdhury, who came from a wealthy family in the port city of Chittagong, was allowed to bring only $12,000 out of Bangladesh each year due to currency regulations. Nevertheless, the I-Unit went undercover in the UK to look into how he built up a real estate empire.
The Bangladeshi Supreme Court attorney, Dr. Shahdeen Malik, told Al Jazeera that it is explicitly stated in the constitution of the nation that lawmakers are required to disclose their overseas holdings.
His bank accounts have been frozen by Bangladeshi authorities, who are also looking into allegations that Chowdhury laundered millions of dollars into the UK.
Sheikh Hasina, the deposed prime minister, was close to Chowdhury before she left Bangladesh in August following the deaths of hundreds of people at the hands of police forces quelling student protests.
Authorities in Bangladesh opened an inquiry into claims of pervasive corruption in Hasina’s administration following her exit.
Since then, the former Land Minister Chowdhury’s and his family’s bank accounts have been frozen by Bangladesh’s central bank, and an investigation has been launched by the state’s Anti-Corruption Commission into claims that he obtained “thousands of crore taka” (hundreds of millions of dollars) illegally and laundered the money in the UK.