Expresso rostrum: big games | Football Leaks: Doyen Auditor was replaced in 2019 but still appears in documents from 2021

Despite having lost the license to audit in Malta, Nexia BT still appears as an auditor for Doyen Sports Investments in a document that this company published in the Maltese commercial register, presented this Thursday in court during the trial of Rui Pinto.

The document was presented by Rui Pinto’s defense during the testimony of Melvin Roberts, a consultant for the Maitland company, who works as administrator of 25 companies in Malta, including Doyen Sports Investments.

In his videoconference testimony, Melvin Roberts explained that Nexia was Doyen’s auditor between 2017 and 2019, the year it was replaced by a smaller auditor, NC.

Asked why this change of auditor, Melvin Roberts said it was just a cost savings. “NC is a small company that we use with our clients, they provide good service at a reasonable price, and we saw no reason to continue with the high costs of a larger auditor,” he explained.

It was then that Rui Pinto’s lawyer, Francisco Teixeira da Mota, confronted a document dated January 2021 from Doyen that still appoints Nexia as the auditor. “I have no explanation for this, but there will be something wrong with the records,” he commented.

In his testimony, Melvin Roberts also confirmed that Doyen Sports Investments is a company without employees and whose objective today is only to collect a set of debts, to later be closed down.

Roberts also stated that there is no legal Doyen Group and that the companies Doyen Sports Investments, Doyen Capital and Doyen Global have no corporate links between them.

The process in which Rui Pinto is on trial, accused of 90 crimes (among which an attempt to extort Doyen), results from an investigation by the Public Ministry based on a criminal complaint by Doyen Sports Investments, which in September 2015 saw dozens of his contracts exposed on the Football Leaks blog.

Asked about the beneficial owner of Doyen Sports Investments, Melvin Roberts confirmed that he was Malik Ali. But he said he was unaware of a group of elements of the Arif family (which financed the creation of Doyen about a decade ago), namely Refik Arif and Tevfik Arif .

In his testimony, Melvin Roberts also said that he was unaware of former Doyen spokesman Francisco Empis, and also said that he was not aware of any legal proceedings in Spain involving Doyen.

Asked by Doyen’s lawyer, Sofia Ribeiro Branco, about whether the company was ever convicted of any crime, Melvin Roberts said no. “As far as I know, and we did an assessment before we took over the management, there was nothing in the records. I am convinced that nothing happened,” he commented.

Doyen’s lawyer also asked if the facts that led Nexia to lose its license to audit in Malta had anything to do with Doyen, Melvin Roberts also replied in the negative. “At all,” said the Maitland manager and Doyen administrator.