Gamal and Alaa Mubarak and six other businessmen, who are officials and former members of the board of directors of the National Bank, arrived at the headquarters of the Giza Criminal Court on Thursday to attend their trial on charges of illegal gains from the sale of National Bank of Egypt, waste of public money, causing huge losses to the economy and destroying the country's banking system through manipulating the stock exchange.
The court decided to postpone the case to hear the witnesses and meet the defense's requests.
The prosecution charged the defendants with obtaining LE2.5 billion, which is the value of the sale of the National Bank of Egypt, in violation of the provisions of the Capital Market Law and the Central Bank.
The defendants agreed to control the shares of the National Bank by forming a controlling stake through the purchase of closed investment funds and selling them without disclosing their identity on the stock exchange, according to investigations.
They have also been accused of hiding their identity while speculating on the shares of the National Bank through cluster companies and closed investment funds they owned in Cyprus and some of the British Isles and transferring their profits abroad.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
