Eight defendants face claims of fraudulent misrepresentation, fake assay certificates, and conspiracy to defraud. Court adjourns to June 29 after service failure.
A Dubai-based precious minerals trading company has commenced a civil fraud action in the High Court before Justice Coker, alleging that eight defendants, including a Gambian gold export broker, its directors, a Guinean gold seller, a local refinery and related individuals, conspired to swindle it out of over one million United States dollars through a sophisticated scheme involving fake gold bars and fraudulent assay documentation.
The case pits Arabia Gulf Diamonds DMCC, a company incorporated under the free zone laws of the United Arab Emirates, and its local partner Safaro Trading Company Limited, against B & M Gold & Silver Brokerage Shipping and Services Limited as the 1st Defendant; Bubacarr Bah, its director and shareholder, as the 2nd Defendant; Mansa Bah, also a director and shareholder, as the 3rd Defendant; Doula Mane, a Guinean national and the alleged gold seller, as the 4th Defendant; Abdullahi Jallow as the 5th Defendant; Uzokwe Ifeanyi, also known as Mustafa Bah, as the 6th Defendant; KK Gold Refinery Company Ltd of Bijilo as the 7th Defendant; and Kabineh Kabba, the main shareholder of KK Gold Refinery, as the 8th Defendant.
The plaintiffs are represented by Counsel Loubna Farage of Farage alongside Counsel Abdul Aziz Bensouda. The Statement of Claim, Writ of Summons and three sworn witness affidavits were filed and received by the Court on 18th of May 2026.
According to the Statement of Claim and supporting affidavits, Arabia Gulf Diamonds came to The Gambia in or around March and April 2026 with an interest in purchasing and exporting gold to Dubai, operating through its local intermediary Safaro Trading Company Limited. Through an introduction by one Amadou Tijan Bah, the plaintiffs were connected to Doula Mane, a Guinean national who claimed to own approximately 200 kilogrammes of gold available for export.
According to the 1st witness statement of Leonid Karpukhin, the authorised representative of Arabia Gulf and a Luxembourgish national, Doula Mane represented that he was the lawful owner of the gold; that it originated from the Republic of Guinea; that he held all documentation necessary for lawful export including a certificate of ownership, a Guinean certificate of origin, a certificate of non-criminality, and export clearance documents; and that he had trusted export agents in B & M Gold & Silver Brokerage whom he had used for prior successful gold transactions. B & M was presented to the plaintiffs as a duly licensed and competent Gambian company, holding a licence issued by the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy dated 4th August 2025.
The parties entered into a Sale and Purchase Agreement dated 1st April 2026, under which the plaintiffs agreed to finance the export logistics, taxes, insurance, documentation and related expenses, with the gold to be independently verified upon arrival in Dubai and purchased at USD$85,000.00 per kilogram.
Before making any payment, the plaintiffs requested that 15 kilogrammes of gold be tested at a refinery. Mane provided 15 gold bars, which were taken to KK Gold Refinery Company Ltd at Bijilo, the 7th Defendant, where they were smelted, weighed and subjected to XRF testing in the presence of Karpukhin, Safaro’s representatives and Mane.
Kabineh Kabba, the 8th Defendant, who the plaintiffs say held himself out as the Chief Executive Officer of KK Refinery, personally supervised the testing and issued assay certificates designated Certificate of Control of Mining Products No. 0009, dated 7th April 2026, representing the gold dore bars as having a purity of approximately 96% to 97% and a carat level of approximately 23 carats.
The plaintiffs paid KK Refinery USD$2,250.00 for the testing service.
Relying on those assay results and on the various representations made by the defendants, Safaro Trading, acting as the nominee remitter on behalf of Arabia Gulf, paid B & M Gold the sum of USD$800,000.00 in cash, in two tranches of USD$600,000.00 and USD$200,000.00, on approximately the 7th day of April 2026. Receipts bearing Invoice Numbers 00018 and 00019 were issued in the name of Doula Mane, as B & M stated it was acting on his behalf.
However, discrepancies quickly emerged. Following payment, B & M provided customs declarations and payment receipts dated 9th April 2026.
Upon examination, Counsel Bensouda found that only approximately GMD4,000,000.00 in customs duties had been paid, far below the USD$460,000.00 represented in the proforma invoice as taxes and customs-related payments. No satisfactory explanation was forthcoming.
When the plaintiffs sought to fix a date for the export of the gold, B & M informed them that the export could not proceed without a further document and an ‘inflow’ document from the Republic of Guinea and that procuring it would require an additional payment of USD$600,000.00. The 5th Defendant, Abdullahi Jallow, represented that he had the necessary contacts to secure this documentation from the Central Bank of Guinea within two days.
The plaintiffs, unwilling to pay the full additional amount, agreed to pay USD$300,000.00, with any further payment conditional on production of the required documentation and successful export of the gold. The sum was paid in cash by Safaro Trading on 16th April 2026 to the beneficiary Doula Mane, and a supplementary receipt was signed on that date.
The inflow document was never produced. Shortly thereafter, communications with the 4th and 5th Defendants ceased and became evasive. Mane subsequently allegedly travelled to Sierra Leone with the remaining approximately 185 kilogrammes of gold at the plaintiffs’ suggestion, hoping that export from that country might be easier to facilitate. All communication from Mane, Jallow and Mansa Bah then ceased entirely, and the gold was never presented to any exporter or export office in Sierra Leone.
As a consequence of the defendants’ failure, Counsel Bensouda arranged for the safe containing the 15 kilogrammes of tested gold stored at his offices in Fajara pending export to be forcibly opened in the presence of a notary public and a welder. The key to the safe had been retained exclusively by Doula Mane, who was by then unreachable and outside the jurisdiction.
Nyanamang S. J. Wally, a Notary Public of The Gambia and the 3rd witness in the case, confirmed in her affidavit that five tamper-proof bags bearing serial numbers H00103514 through H00103518 were found fully sealed, intact and with no signs of tampering. Each bag contained three bars of the alleged gold.
The 15 bars were weighed, each approximating one kilogram, consistent with KK Refinery’s Assay Report and then individually tested using an XRF machine. The results were devastating. Each of the 15 bars registered gold purity percentages of approximately 1% to 2.3%, directly contradicting KK Refinery’s assay certificates, which had represented over 96% purity at approximately 23 carats. The notary public stated in her affidavit that it became apparent to her that none of the 15 gold bars was genuine gold.
The plaintiffs allege that Kabineh Kabba fraudulently calibrated or manipulated the XRF testing machine used at KK Refinery to generate artificially inflated purity readings.
They further allege that during the initial testing at KK Refinery, Kabba prohibited the plaintiffs’ representatives from using their own XRF testing machine, directed that the compound gate be closed so no one could enter or leave, required the plaintiffs’ representatives to remain upstairs while smelting was conducted downstairs, and caused the bars to be brought upstairs only after the smelting process was complete, all, the plaintiffs contend, calculated to prevent independent verification of the gold’s true purity.
The plaintiffs claim jointly and severally against all eight defendants. Among the reliefs sought are: declarations that the defendants fraudulently procured and facilitated the transaction; that all representations concerning ownership, authority, documentation, exportability, purity, quality and genuineness of the gold were false and fraudulent; and that the assay certificates issued by the 7th and 8th Defendants were false, irregular, void and of no legal effect.
The plaintiffs further seek: an order rescinding the Sale and Purchase Agreement and all connected documents; an order directing the defendants to pay USD$1,100,000.00 as money had and received on a total failure of consideration; special damages of USD$312,786.00 covering the cost of a privately chartered jet (USD$285,582.00), flights for the plaintiffs’ representatives (USD$14,183.00), hotel accommodation (USD$12,501.00) and other expenses; general damages for fraud, deceit, fraudulent misrepresentation and conspiracy; and interest at the commercial rate of 18% per annum from 5th April 2026 until judgment.
The plaintiffs additionally seek orders lifting the corporate veil of both B & M Gold and KK Gold Refinery, to hold their respective directors and shareholders personally, jointly and severally liable, and orders for the restitution and disgorgement of all profits, commissions and proceeds received by the defendants from the transaction.
When the matter came before the court on Thursday, 12th June 2026, before Justice Coker. Counsel Loubna Farage, with Counsel Abdul Aziz Bensouda, appeared for the plaintiffs. Counsel I. Drammeh and S.M. Tambedou appeared for the 3rd Defendant; Counsel C. Mane, B.S. Conteh, Counsel Njie and S. Sonko appeared for the 4th to 8th Defendants; and Counsel Darboe appeared for the 1st and 2nd Defendants.
Counsel C. Mane, appearing for the 4th to 8th Defendants, drew the court’s attention to a motion filed by the 7th and 8th Defendants on 2nd May 2026, which had also been filed on the same date. When Justice Coker inquired whether the 3rd Defendant had been served with the motion, Counsel Drammeh informed the court that service had not been effected on his client. Counsel Darboe, appearing for the 1st and 2nd Defendants, similarly confirmed that his clients had not been served with the motion, and additionally informed the court that the 2nd Defendant had filed a motion.
Justice Coker ruled that the court could not proceed in the absence of proper service on all parties.
“I don’t think we can make progress in the absence of service to the parties involved,” Justice Coker stated from the bench.
The hearing was accordingly adjourned. The matter returned before the court on Monday, 29th June 2026, for counsel to address the court following service of the outstanding motions on all parties.
Background: B & M Gold & Silver Brokerage Shipping and Services Limited is incorporated in The Gambia under Company No. 2021/C16116, TIN 2100348062, with its principal office at Coastal Road, opposite Green House, West Coast Region, Sinchu Sorrie. The company was incorporated on or about 6th August 2021 and registered to carry on business in geological ventures, mining of gold, metals and minerals, consultancy services, and import and export of goods.
KK Gold Refinery Company Ltd, based at Bijilo, The Gambia, is described in the pleadings as a refinery and assayer. The plaintiffs allege that Kabineh Kabba, at all material times, controlled and dominated KK Refinery and used its corporate structure as a vehicle for the issuance of false assay documentation.
All allegations are contained in pleadings and affidavits before the court. They remain untested and are disputed by the defendants. We will bring the defendant’s statement of defence as the case continues.
The matter continues before the High Court, and Kexx Sanneh of KexxNews will follow the proceedings and report accordingly to bring facts since the case has taken a political dimension with allegations emerging well before the facts are established before a competent court.
