The press and publicity officer of leading British Muslim
charity Penny Appeal offered bribes to a senior British Asian journalist for
writing stories against Adeem Younis, founder of the same charity.
It can be revealed that Pedro Carvalho of FNIK PR met a
Pakistani journalist on behalf of Penny Appeal’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO)
Aamer Naeem OBE and gave him classified information to write defamatory stories
to bring the charity’s founder down in the tug of war between the founder and
the CEO.
An investigation shows that Pedro Carvalho has met – and
spoken to - more than eight journalists after the coup at the charity which saw
the CEO removing Adeem Younis while he was mid-air. Pedro Carvalho is the right-hand man of the Penny Appeal’s CEO and he has openly told several
journalists that he was speaking and meeting them on behalf of Aamer Naeem.
Pedro offered bribes in the form of trips abroad loaded with
cash, hospitality and luxurious stay to journalists in the near future in return
for writing dirty stories on Adeem Younis.
Soon after Pedro met these journalists, at least three
different publications published stories against Adeem Younis making
allegations against him. These stories published details of the row inside
Penny Appeal was known only to Aamer Naeem, Adeem Younis and few others.
A source inside Penny Appeal has shared that Pedro was tasked to meet and
manage the media members who sent questions to Aamer Naeem OBE and Penny Appeal
regarding the coup at the Penny Appeal.
Pedro Carvalho offered to fly journalists to in business
class and promised to look after them well. He told these journalists that they
should write stories to “destroy” Adeem Younis. He told these journalists that
Adeem Younis was involved in corruption while Aamer Naeem OBE was trying to
protect the charity. He told journalists not to write anything about Aamer
Naeem and assured them that he was acting on behalf of Mr. Naeem.
It has been widely reported that Adeem Younis was told at
Manchester airport when he landed back from a trip to Pakistan that he was no
longer allowed to seek entrance into the Wakefield Offices of the charity and
also barred from speaking to anyone.
Since then Aamer Naeem is at the center of explosive
bullying, harassment and intimidation storm following grievances launched by a number of senior executives who were threatened in the Muslim charity’s office.
Penny Appeal confirmed that a number of senior members of
the charity has launched extraordinary complaints that Aamer Naeem allegedly
presided over campaigns of targeted harassment, including attempts to literally
drive people out of the organization in a bid to cover his own leadership
failings.
One female employee of staff was reduced to tears and
humiliation on numerous occasions said a trusted source at the charity.
Locks of the charity’s headquarters were changed, IT servers
were removed which brought the work of the charity to a standstill for a number
of weeks and full-time security guards were hired to guard the building to
prevent anyone from unauthorized from entering the building.
Aamer Naeem was
awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) medal in the Queen’s 2019 New
Year Honors list. Penny Appeal had said at the time that the award has been
given for work to “Muslim Community Development”.
Adeem Younis is known as a serial entrepreneur who founded
Single Muslim sites at a young age and turned it into a big success. It’s
claimed that the site has helped to facilitate over 110,000 marriages. In 2018
Adeem Younis won Charity Chair of the Year award at the Third Sector Awards.
Earlier this year, he was recognized by then Prime Minister Theresa May for his
“exceptional service to the charity sector”.
According to the Charity Commission, Penny Appeal's income
for the financial year ending April 2018 was £24.6m, 75 percent of which it
spent on charitable activities.