THE Myanmar Foreign Trade Bank, and the Myanmar Investment and Commercial Bank will soon resume account transfer services in accordance with instructions issued last week by the Trade Council, said a business leader in Yangon.

U Sein Win Hlaing, the secretary general of the Union of Myanmar Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry, said the Trade Council will permit the resumption of account transfers in banks that handle foreign currency, to prevent the recurrence of recent fraudulent practices among some traders.

Account transfer services were originally suspended at the two banks in July 2001, said U Myat Thin Aung, the chairman of Aung Aung Enterprise Ltd.
The Trade Council’s decision was welcomed by Dr Maung Maung Lay, the chairman of the Myanmar Pharmaceutical and Medical Equipment Entrepreneurs Association.

He said that allowing money transfers between accounts might prevent the type of fraud that cheated Ni Lay Naing Co. Ltd, where he serves as the managing director, out of about K67 million a few months ago.

In March Ni Lay Naing – which makes no money from exports and is therefore not allowed to import – paid K67 million to a specific trading company to import medical equipment and pharmaceuticals on its behalf.

“But a director of the trading company ran away with our money in April,” said Dr Maung Maung Lay .

Similarly, the Pwint Oo furniture manufacturing company paid K8.7 million to a Yangon-based export-import company to import steel bars, only to find that the director of the company had absconded with money, said the furniture company’s manager.

“Allowing account transfers in foreign-currency banks will help prevent a repetition of this kind of fraud,” said Dr Maung Maung Lay.

In a related development, the Trade Council last week began allowing traders to import without volume limitations, as long as the value of the imported items did not exceed the company’s export earnings, industry sources said. Previous regulations allowed the import of essential items equal to 80 or 90 per cent of the total value of export earnings, while non-essential imports could not exceed 20 per cent of export earnings.

The Trade Council is headed by Deputy Senior General Maung Aye, the vice chairman of State Peace and Development Council.