MIC Freeze of Rs 45 Million: Did Kreeti Harrah Have the Authority?

A legal dispute centred on the Mauritius Investment Corporation (MIC) has raised serious questions about whether a senior official acted beyond her powers when she secured a court order freezing roughly Rs 45 million belonging to a company called Menlo Park.

Kreeti Devi Jugasing Harrah was appointed Officer-in-Charge of the MIC on 21 November 2024. The MIC is a state-backed investment vehicle set up under the Bank of Mauritius to support businesses affected by economic shocks. Harrah held the post until 2 June 2026, but it is her actions in the very first weeks that are now at the centre of a formal legal dispute.

On 9 December 2024, Harrah filed an affidavit in support of an application for a Mareva injunction, a court order that freezes assets to prevent them from being moved or hidden before a legal claim is resolved. In that affidavit, at paragraph 62, the MIC requested the freezing of a Menlo Park account at the Mauritius Commercial Bank (MCB) to the value of approximately Rs 45 million. The order was granted.

Menlo Park is now contesting the legitimacy of that entire process. The company argues that the mandate authorising Harrah to act on behalf of the MIC, signed by the then Governor of the Bank of Mauritius, Dr Rama Sithanen, was legally void and carried no valid authority. Sithanen signed this mandate on 5 December 2024, just days before the injunction was sought.

Further complicating matters, Menlo Park says that Harrah herself acknowledged under oath that she did not have all the relevant information in hand at the time she signed the affidavit. If accurate, this admission raises questions about the basis on which the court order was obtained and whether it should ever have been granted.

This dispute has now escalated. On 30 October, Menlo Park served a formal letter of demand on the Bank of Mauritius, the parent institution of the MIC, signalling that legal action is being considered.

What this means: At stake is not just a commercial dispute between one company and a state institution. The case touches on fundamental questions of governance at the MIC: who has the power to authorise major legal actions, whether proper procedures were followed, and whether a court-ordered asset freeze was obtained on shaky legal ground. If Menlo Park's arguments hold up, the MIC and the Bank of Mauritius could face significant legal and financial exposure. The case is also likely to draw attention to the role played by Dr Sithanen, who served as Bank of Mauritius Governor during this period, and to the internal processes that governed decisions at the MIC in its early post-election transition phase.

Source: ION News