Poor Pakistani rickshaw driver’s fear after finding US$22 million was in bank account
- Case mirrors dozens of similar stories in recent weeks
- Bank accounts in poor residents’ names are flooded with cash, then suddenly emptied in a laundering scheme
It took rickshaw driver Mohammad Rasheed a year to save 300 rupees to buy his daughter a bike, so when he found three billion rupees (US$22.5 million) had passed through an unused bank account in his name, he was stunned … and scared.
“I started sweating and shivering,” said the 43-year-old – just the latest victim of a money laundering scheme that Pakistan’s new prime minister, Imran Khan, has vowed to crush.
When he got a call from the Federal Investigation Agency, Rasheed’s first inclination was to go into hiding, but friends and family members finally convinced him to cooperate with officials.
His case mirrors dozens of similar stories in recent weeks that have filled newspapers in Pakistan and riled a populace long accustomed to extravagant tales of corruption and theft.
The incidents follow a similar arc – bank accounts in poor residents’ names are flooded with cash, then suddenly emptied in a laundering scheme that has likely seen hundreds of millions of dollars moved out of the country.
Rasheed’s name was eventually cleared, but his anxiety remained.