US bribery trial ends with former Hong Kong minister Patrick Ho Chi-ping branded a cheat ‘like out of a movie’, who undermined world markets
- Prosecutors said Patrick Ho’s use of ‘classic’ bribery as he worked for oil firm CEFC China Energy was ‘not how legitimate business is done’
- But Ho’s defence called the prosecution ‘deeply flawed’ and hammered the credibility of a star prosecution witness
A US prosecutor told a jury on Tuesday that “cheating” by former Hong Kong home affairs minister Patrick Ho Chi-ping undermined faith in the international market by lining the pockets of two African presidents to secure oil rights for a Chinese energy conglomerate.
But a defence attorney for Ho called the prosecution “deeply flawed” and assailed the credibility of a Senegalese diplomat who had been indicted alongside Ho before agreeing to testify for the government.
Ho has pleaded not guilty to charges of money laundering, conspiracy and violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in a bribery case that cast a harsh light on several former United Nations officials.
“There’s something rotten about Cheikh Gadio, the man who lied from that witness stand so that he could get a free pass,” the defence attorney, Edward Kim, said in his closing argument, referring to the former foreign minister of Senegal and a critical government witness.
Gadio told jurors last week that Ho and his colleagues at CEFC China Energy paid a US$2 million bribe to the president of Chad amid oil talks in 2014. He said the cash was secreted in gift boxes, and that President Idriss Deby angrily rejected the money and ordered it removed from his compound.