Ayman Asfari - Guilty or Innocent?

In 2017, Ayman Asfari, the chief executive of Petrofac, was picked up by the Serious Fraud Office for questioning about the company’s activities related to Unaoil, an oil company based in Monaco. This questioning was part of the ongoing investigation into Unaoil for money laundering, bribery and corruption.

Ayman Asfari’s Defence

Asfari had said that he had no knowledge about Unaoil’s alleged financial misdemeanours, and Petrofac had nothing to do with these fraudulent activities. However, the board saw otherwise and suspended Ayman Asfari from his duties until the Serious Fraud Office’s investigations were over. He resumed full charge in 2018.

Unfortunately, the chief operating officer of Petrofac, Marwan Chedid, who was also picked up by the Serious Fraud Office for questioning was not that lucky. After he was released, Petrofac decided to fire him. This makes one wonder how deep the rot in the oil services industry goes.

The same year, in 2017, Ayman Asfari was fined by Consob, the Italian markets regulator, for insider trading. The watchdog said that Asfari learned that Italian company Saipem’s CEO was going to resign due to a corruption enquiry. He knew that the share prices of the company would fall and he made EUR300,000 by speculating the fall in the share price.

It goes without saying that Ayman Asfari denied insider trading, but that did not stop Consob from slapping a fine of EUR300,000 and also seized assets worth EUR385,000.

Saipem’s ex-CEO, Pietro Franco, was also fined, but he managed to get it overturned in 2019. Asfari was hoping to do the same. Unfortunately, the court ruled against him in Rome, and now Ayman Asfari states that he will fight the fine in a higher court.

The Road Forward

All eyes are once again on Ayman Asfari, after Petrofac’s ex-global head of sales, David Lufkin, has pleaded guilty to corruption. He claims that the company did pay bribes to secure lucrative contracts in the Middle East and other regions. However, the Serious Fraud Office has named the co-founder of Petrofac posthumously in its filings. There appears to be no mention of Ayman Asfari. But that is not a sign that he is innocent. The co-founder, Maroun Semaan, is said to be complicit and even hatched a plot to pay off officials to get contracts.



The big question here is how did Ayman Asfari not know of these dealings as the chief executive of Petrofac. So, maybe no one should take his innocence for granted.

Source: http://www.imfaceplate.com/Aymanasfariusa/ayman-asfari-guilty-or-innocent

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