Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – This is the story of Eliezer Fishman, a prominent Israeli entrepreneur who has many lines of business. Starting from media to property.

Thanks to the size of the business octopus, Forbes Israel (2013) noted that he has assets of US$ 765 million or Rp. 12 trillion today. Even, Forbes in 2007 he also placed him in the ranks of the 40 richest people in Israel.

Unfortunately, all of this wealth was apparently obtained thanks to unreasonable actions which resulted in his bankruptcy. What’s the story?

Eliezer Fishman, notes Uri Ram in The Globalization of Israel (2008), is an entrepreneur who was born thanks to the success of the Economic Revolution of the 1980s in the Jewish State. Unfortunately, not much is known about how he built his business.

One of the pieces of information revealed by Ram was only when he was named the 10 richest people in Israel in 1997 who had a super-large business empire in the property sector. Thanks to this, said Ram, he has the typical super luxurious lifestyle of a rich person. He has cars, houses and luxury villas. Likewise, he often goes abroad.

However, according to Shelly Gottfried in Contemporary Oligarchies in Developing Democracies (2019), his success as an entrepreneur occurred thanks to his efforts to build relationships with policy makers, one of which was the Israeli PM, Shimon Peres.

On this basis, he benefits from government policies. After that he dKnown to own many properties, a network of research organizations, telecommunications, gas stations, and media companies, namely business daily Globes and newspapers Yedioth Ahronoth.

With his large business and political network, it is no surprise that the Times of Israel called Fishman “the country’s economic and political controller.”

Even so, this relationship later hit Fishman hard. In 2015, Israeli society was shocked by a credit scandal. This scandal involved providing easy and fast credit from the government to several entrepreneurs, including Fishman.

Quote Times of IsraelFishman and other entrepreneurs used this credit for their personal needs, including purchasing companies privatized by the government and lifestyle needs.

Of course this makes people angry. Credit that should be for the community is instead used by a handful of entrepreneurs for their personal gain. What’s worse is that this has been going on silently, meaning it has been going on for years.

Regarding Fishman, the Israeli media said that the use of credit from the government to property entrepreneurs has been going on for a long time. Apparently Fishman’s luxurious lifestyle was obtained from his debts to a government bank.

“Instead of having billions of dollars in assets, he actually owes more than US$ 1.13 billion or Rp. 14 T to major Israeli banks whose funds are used to maintain a luxurious lifestyle,” he wrote. Times of Israelquoted Monday (13/11).

According to the investigation Times of Israel The smooth flow of credit from large government-owned banks is because Fishman has a large media network. So, in return, Fishman will report on these banks in a positive image.

In the end, this action made Fishman have to sit in a prison chair to take responsibility for his actions. At the same time, he was examined for his inability to pay all his debts.

As reported Haaretz quoted (13/11), the Tel Aviv Court then decided that Fishman was bankrupt. As a result, all his assets disappeared because they were confiscated by the government. He immediately fell into poverty and was named the biggest bankruptcy case in Israel’s history.

This incident then became a major blow for Fishman. Previously, in 2006 he was also involved in a currency speculation scandal. Forbes noted he traded Turkish Lira currency which cost him a lot of assets.

Thanks to the case that occurred in the 2015-2017 period, Fishman can now no longer do anything. His wealth and honor have been lost.

[Gambas:Video CNBC]

(mfa/sef)