Bangladesh lacks experts to recover $234b looted under Hasina: Financial Times

Bangladesh is struggling to build the expertise needed to prosecute cases and recover billions of dollars allegedly looted during Sheikh Hasina's regime, according to a new documentary by the Financial Times.

The film, "Bangladesh's Missing Billions: Stolen in Plain Sight", interviews protesters, experts, business figures and politicians to highlight the vast scale of corruption during Hasina's rule, and the challenge of clawing back the money that left the country.

It alleges that much of the stolen wealth was funnelled abroad through over- and under-invoicing of trade, informal transfer systems such as hundi and hawla, and property deals in Britain. London in particular emerged as a favoured destination, with money reportedly laundered into high-end real estate.

The documentary names several figures connected to the Hasina regime. They include Tulip Siddiq, Hasina's niece and until recently a Labour MP in the UK. Former land minister Saifuzzaman Chowdhury and S Alam Group chairman Mohammed Saiful Alam were also cited for their alleged roles in moving wealth abroad.

John Reed, the FT's South Asia bureau chief, described some of the activities under Hasina as "like a movie plot". He said the scale of corruption was beyond anything he had seen elsewhere. According to him, banks were brought under regime control, often with the help of military intelligence officials.

"We heard stories of bank directors being taken away in some cases at gunpoint by intelligence officials and being forced to resign their positions after signing over their shares to people close to the old regime," he said.

Mushtaq Khan, economics professor at the University of London, told the filmmakers that corruption was no secret during Hasina's tenure. 

"It was in the press, in the media, people were openly talking about it," he said. "Corruption was very public and in your face, but no one cared because no one had the power to do anything about it. And most people were so fearful that if they spoke out, they would disappear."

While documenting how money was taken out, the FT film also examines the immense obstacles to bringing it back. 

Susannah Savage, an FT correspondent who previously reported from Dhaka, said: "Knowing that money has been stolen is one thing, but getting it back is something else. One of the problems of asset recovery is that often it involves settlements – cutting a deal with whoever stole the cash. It becomes a balance between getting the money back and what is acceptable to the Bangladeshi public. Criminal prosecutions require a very high standard of evidence."

Ifty Islam, an adviser to Bangladesh Bank's asset recovery taskforce, described the process as one of the largest and most complicated in history. 

He noted that those who looted funds could afford the best financial advisers to hide their assets, while Bangladesh lacked enough skilled investigators and lawyers to build watertight cases.

"You can't recover money unless you know where it's gone," he said. 

Reed added, "Bangladesh is struggling with the lack of experts with enough skills to lay the groundwork for prosecutions that might bring some of this money back."

Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus, also featured in the film, acknowledged that full recovery was unlikely. "People say you can't get all of them. I said, 'Whatever amount we can get.' We have to find concrete evidence, follow the track, and get the support of relevant governments."

Yunus also mentioned that one estimate shows $234 billion was looted from the banking and business sector in different ways. "This is probably the biggest money plundering from any country in the world."

Savage added that international cooperation would be crucial. "If the Yunus administration can get governments elsewhere to take action like it's happened in the UK, then those wheels will be set in motion and hard to stop," she said.

Yet questions remain over whether the conglomerates accused of moving money abroad will continue to wield influence over any future government. 

Reed said, "While Bangladesh's revolution seems like a turning point, it's also possible that the country could revert to a situation where one group has too much political power."

However,  Mushtaq Khan said, "Reform of the basic institutions that are now center stage and I think it will be very hard to push that back whoever comes to power."

The film also situates Hasina's downfall within the student-led protests of 2024. Coordinators Rafia Rehnuma Hridi and Rezwan Ahmed Rifad recalled the violent crackdown that culminated in Hasina fleeing into exile on 5 August.

The documentary closes with a reflection from Hridi: "Our greatest fear is that we may not be able to fulfil the promises we made to our martyrs."