According to the accusation, Ms. Mai Thi Hong Hanh is the owner of Xuyen Viet Oil Company. In 2015, this company had a charter capital of 50 billion VND, by December 2021, the charter capital increased to 3,000 billion VND. In 2023, this company had 15 branches, 6 gas stations, 9 related companies, established by Ms. Hanh or acquired shares of a number of enterprises.

According to regulations, environmental protection tax is an indirect tax, collected on products and goods that, when used, have a negative impact on the environment, including gasoline and oil. The taxpayer is the consumer, the tax amount is calculated into the selling price of goods and services and is given to the seller when purchasing goods so that the seller can pay it to the state budget on a monthly basis on behalf of the buyer.

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Defendant Mai Thi Hong Hanh, owner of Xuyen Viet Oil Company. Photo: Ministry of Public Security

The main trader is responsible for managing and paying this tax amount to the state budget on behalf of the consumer periodically (no later than 90 days from the date of submitting the declaration).

Investigation results show that from October 2021 to July 2022, although she collected more than VND 1,244 billion in environmental protection tax on behalf of the State, Ms. Mai Thi Hong Hanh did not implement and did not direct employees to pay environmental protection tax to the state budget as prescribed.

Ms. Hanh transferred money from Xuyen Viet Oil Company's account to her personal accounts and used it for other personal purposes, causing the loss of the above amount.

Ms. Hanh no longer has the financial capacity to transfer the collected tax money to the state budget. Therefore, there is a basis to determine that the amount of environmental protection tax that Ms. Hanh collected for the State was transferred from the account of Xuyen Viet Oil Company to form assets under Ms. Hanh's name or this female tycoon used the money for other personal purposes (buying real estate under her personal name for investment, lending to friends, giving bribes, etc.)

The accusations stated that Ms. Mai Thi Hong Hanh had given bribes 22 times, totaling more than 31 billion VND. At the investigation agency, Ms. Hanh realized that her actions were illegal and confessed honestly.

The investigation agency determined that Ms. Hanh's companies have bad debts of more than 6,178 billion VND. Xuyen Viet Oil Company alone owes more than 5,907 billion VND to banks, of which it owes more than 1,365 billion VND to BIDV Bank; more than 77 billion VND to Agribank; and more than 1,603 billion VND to Vietinbank.

Regarding the signs of violations related to the loan of Xuyen Viet Oil Company at Vietinbank Ben Tre branch and the signs of violations related to the loans of Xuyen Viet Oil Company at Vietinbank and 3 other banks, up to now, the specialized agencies have not yet concluded the valuation of assets related to the loans.

Therefore, on August 30, 2024, the Ministry of Public Security's Security Investigation Agency separated the behavior and documents on this issue to continue investigating and clarifying according to the notice of acceptance and assignment to handle information sources about the crime.

Currently, in 17 accounts at 8 banks of Ms. Hanh and 19 accounts of Xuyen Viet Oil Company at 5 banks, there are only more than 4 billion VND and more than 244 USD left.

Ms. Hanh stated that Xuyen Viet Oil Company opened accounts at BIDV, SHB, and Vietinbank to use for the purpose and function of setting up the Price Stabilization Fund.

Based on the account opening documents and information provided by the banks, the Investigation Agency determined that Ms. Hanh did not register the procedures to identify these accounts as Price Stabilization Fund accounts.

These are just regular payment accounts and these banks have not received any written requests from state management agencies regarding the Price Stabilization Fund. Therefore, the Supreme People's Procuracy believes that there is no basis to consider the banks' related responsibilities.