part of a Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance and identity verification process.
Although Mr. Mark is known within Mossack Fonseca as the beneficial owner of the companies, he used nominee directors for years to mask his relationship with the shell entities.
PREMIUM TIMES also found that one of the companies, Goldwin Transworld Limited is a shareholder in London-based Goldwin Services (UK) Limited, along with one Anne Folkard, a British citizen believed to be Mr. Mark’s long time associate and front.
Company documents in the U.K. show that Mr. Mark himself was a director in Goldwin Services (UK) Limited between October 3, 1994 and January 25, 1996, when he substituted himself with another shell company he had registered offshore, Goldwin Transworld Limited.
Ms. Folkard authored one of the documents in Mr. Mark’s file with Mossack Fonseca.
In 2010, apparently after Mossack Fonseca became suspicion about his business dealings, Mr. Mark sent documents across to the Panamanian firm through Ms. Folkard to convince the offshore provider of secrecy to continue to serve as his registered agents in Panama and the British Virgin Islands
It is not immediately clear when Mr. Mark and Ms. Folkard met, but the letter sent to Mossack Fonseca by Ms. Folkard on behalf of the former Senate President indicated that they had been friends before 1994.
In the letter, dated October 20, 2010, Ms. Folkard wrote:
“You asked if I could confirm Senator David Mark’s address in Nigeria and I am happy to
