Qatari Ponzi victim wants money back

Barwa Real Estate , Qatar’s second-largest property developer, told the Doha Securities Market, on which the company is listed, that it had terminated its loan facility with Frankel Enterprises “immediately upon learning the risks … related to this convention”.

Barwa did not say how much it had lent to Frankel, which allegedly promised investors significant returns in exchange for funding the import to SA of components for antiretroviral drugs, but lawyer Dean Rees, who represented Frankel in its February agreement with Barwa, yesterday said the Doha-based company had put in “approximately 30,3m”.

A document detailing the Frankel-Barwa deal said the developer would provide as much as 40m and get a return of about 18% for a 17-week investment.

Barwa said that in terminating the agreement it had prevented a “significant amount” of the credit from being used and that the amount at stake was “not material to the rest of investments”. Barwa’s chief communications officer, Bassel Hanbali, said he could give no further details about his company’s loan.

“Honestly, I don’t know. I don’t know anything about it,” he said.

Chief financial officer Tamer Mohamed Khedr, corporate finance head Adam Wilson and corporate finance executive Charlie Hill-Wood did not answer their cellphones.

Tannenbaum, who lives in Sydney, denies any wrongdoing. Rees, whom many investors regard as Tannenbaum’s accomplice in the alleged scheme, insists he is a victim and has been duped as well. Yesterday, Rees said Barwa terminated its agreement after he informed the company at the end of last month that two transactions it had funded were forgeries.

Yesterday marked a third successive fall in share price for Barwa.

The company closed down 3% at 34,6 Qatar riyals (9,50), after previous declines of 8,2% and 4,9%.

While Rees said he did not know the total value of money put into the scheme, which came to light last month after it stopped paying investors the prodigious returns they were expecting, he said the money paid in by foreign investors was about £30m.

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