Pham Thoai and Bap's mother charity scandal: Auditing firm cannot fully verify transaction cash flow

Pham Thoai is a TikToker with many followers, famous for selling products via livestream, not only calling for support for baby Bap, he also previously mobilized donations for victims of storm No. 3 in 2024 - Photo: FBNV

Collecting over 14.7 billion VND, there is an amount that cannot be verified because Bap's mother provided inconsistent information.

After more than a month of waiting, on the evening of April 3, TikToker Pham Thoai announced the "Report on the inspection of the revenue and expenditure of the charity fund to support baby Nguyen Phan Minh Hai".

This report was prepared by Dai A Vietnam Auditing Company Limited (DAVN) to verify the reasonableness and transparency of the revenue and expenditure in the charity campaign, donating to support baby Minh Hai - affectionately known as baby Bap, who has a terminal illness and needs money for chemotherapy, surgery and other medical services.

According to the audit firm’s report, Pham Thoai contributed about 1.073 billion VND to the fund to support baby Bap, plus contributions from other organizations and individuals, the total is over 14.7 billion VND. Thus, the actual amount is lower than the previously circulated figure of 16 billion VND.

After deducting the payments to two hospitals in Singapore, the charity account under Pham Thoai's name still has a surplus of 65 million VND (as of March 1, 2025). At the same time, this account also has a surplus of nearly 35 million VND, money donated by benefactors to support flood victims.

The audit firm said that during the process of conducting the audit report, certain limitations remained.

For example, it is not possible to work directly with the hospital, the hospital cannot confirm with the auditor the total costs paid, the intermediary payment parties refuse to provide statements. With this reality, the audit unit has alternative procedures.

Notably, Dai A Vietnam Audit also noted that on December 30, 2024, National University Hospital issued a payment request for approximately S$40,000, equivalent to VND779 million. On the same day, the Pham Van Thoai charity fund account _1296 (MBBank) transferred the corresponding amount to the intermediary, La Tran Ngoc Tran, to pay this expense.

However, Bap's mother - who paid the money at the hospital - could not provide documents confirming that she had paid the above amount. Instead, she only provided a receipt for another payment, the transaction was made at a later stage (January 27, 2025). Therefore, the auditing unit did not have enough basis to confirm that the amount of 779 million VND was paid directly to NUH Hospital.

Regarding the above amount, Pham Thoai said that he personally spent it from his charity account to support baby Bap. Although it was not recorded by the auditing company because it did not meet accounting standards and regulations, Pham Thoai confidently affirmed: "The money donated by benefactors was used for the right purpose."

If the community does not recognize it, Pham Thoai will choose to deduct the amount of money he has contributed himself. At that time, nominally, the amount of money this TikToker is considered to have contributed to Bap will decrease to around 274 million VND, instead of more than 1 billion VND as originally.

Pham Thoai hopes Bap's mother will keep her promise to publish all statements.

"Thoai has taken every measure to ensure transparency. If there are any suspicions, Thoai is ready to cooperate with the authorities to clarify. Thoai is ready to go to Singapore with benefactors to directly confirm the suspicions," he said.

Regarding the reason for his silence in the past time, this TikToker said that he had to work with the auditing company, contact the hospital, and related parties to collect and verify information. Gathering all the documents required by the independent auditor took a lot of time.

It can be seen that although Pham Thoai has proactively worked with many related parties and cooperated with independent auditors, there are still many problems in the revenue and expenditure transactions of Ms. Le Thi Thu Hoa (Bap's mother).

Immediately after Pham Thoai confirmed that he had completed the disclosure of his statement through his post, many people immediately “called out” Bap’s mother. Because Ms. Le Thi Thu Hoa was the person who directly received and spent the above amount of money. At the same time, the online community also believed that there was another large amount of donations that the community had sent to Ms. Hoa’s account and those of her close relatives, before and after Pham Thoai called for donations.

“The important thing is how Bap’s mother uses the money,” blue tick account To Duc Quynh raised the issue. Meanwhile, Ngoc Hien commented: “That means Thoai donated and transferred the money in full to Bap’s mother. As for how the money is spent in detail, it is up to Bap’s mother.”

Finally, Pham Thoai also shared: "I understand that it is my responsibility to provide full statements related to the donation amount, including statements from Ms. Le Thi Thu Hoa's account. However, this is a personal account, so the disclosure depends on Ms. Hoa's decision or upon request of the authorities. This is beyond my initiative.

I can only demonstrate my efforts to make all information transparent by repeatedly asking Ms. Hoa to publish the statement. I still hope she will fulfill her promise to publish all the statements, to fulfill her obligation to the community."

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Source: https://tuoitre.vn/lum-xum-tu-thien-pham-thoai-va-me-bap-hang-kiem-toan-chua-the-xac-minh-day-du-dong-tien-giao-dich-20250403225814959.htm