Axact’s executive reveals how critics silenced through legal threats

ISLAMABAD: His confession was like of a hit man. Umair Hamid, the executive of Axact Company, arrested in the United States this week, had made startling confessions when held in Pakistan last year.   

While the American court charged him in connection with the US$140million fake degree scandal late Wednesday, earlier, he escaped the imprisonment in Pakistan by volunteering as a prosecution witness.  

Umair then revealed how he would coerce the news organizations into removing from their websites the stories against Axact particularly after The New York Times ran a detailed investigation unmasking the fake degree fraud. Many of them were forced into pulling out this story due to legal threats.

Umair had also spilled the beans about the ‘Edward Snowden’ of Axact who got in touch with the reporter that exposed this scam. While the Axact management harassed the whistle blower into silence, the damage had already been done.    

This 30-year executive of Axact though managed to flee from Pakistan after recording confessions before the court of a magistrate in Karachi in June last year; he resumed the fake degree operation from the US. He duped Americans into paying upfront fees. 

“Umair Hamid allegedly took hefty upfront fees from young men and women seeking an education, leaving them with little more than useless pieces of papers, “said Preet Bharara, attorney of US federal court in Manhattan. 

In May last year, Axact came under microscopic scrutiny when The New York Times broke a scandal shining light on the notorious business of fake degrees. Umair who had joined Axact in 2006 as an assistant executive also came under investigation.   

His ‘impressive work’ was rewarded with rapid promotions. He was vice president (corporate communications) of Axact by the time this house of card fell. 

As The New York Times broke the scandal, Shoaib Sheikh assigned Umair to ensure the removal of the story from the web.  “My task was to ensure the removal of the news from internet with the close coordination of legal department,” Umair said in a confessional statement recorded before the court of magistrate in June last year.  

This was not the first time that websites carrying any defamatory material about Axact were coerced through legal threats. Instead, Umair told the court that “my team had given results in the past.” 

Our legal team sent notices to all the news websites which either published or shared The New York Times article, he further recorded, and “my job was to call those companies to receive the acknowledgment of legal notices and discuss the same with their concerned departments.”  

“I managed to remove the news from local Pakistani websites and the US magazine “Forbes”. However, we were unable to get it removed from The New York Times website,” he said. 

Then Umair explained how the scandal unfolded. Axact started receiving refunds claim from its fat clients in fake degree business, a development that triggered panic in the management as business suffered a great loss. Later, a former customer in UAE revealed about the whistleblower, Yasir Jamshed, a former employee whose brother was still working with Axact.  

He was contacted through Umair’s phone, his statement reads. After threats of legal action, Yasir promised to mend the ways. It was during the process of investigation by Axact that Yasir revealed having been approached by FBI and Declan Walsh, reporter of The New York Times who broke the story. He also claimed having been approached by a Pakistani media owner.  

The information was subsequently passed on to Shoaib Sheikh, chief executive of Axact, who took it lightly. But damage had already been done. Umair further disclosed in this confessional statement that incident of data theft had also occurred before this scandal and the suspects were handed over to the police and fired from the service.   Umair said he was also involved in destroying the data in collaboration with other staff members after the FIA started investigation.