Justice Muslim Hassan of the Federal High Court in Lagos
has ordered the temporary forfeiture of the sum of
$153 , 310, 000 , which a former Minister of Petroleum
Resources , Mrs. Diezani Alison- Madueke , allegedly siphoned
from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and stashed
in three banks in the country .
Out of the allegedly stolen $153 . 3m , a sum of N 23 , 446,
300 ,000 was kept in Sterling Bank Plc , N 9, 080, 000, 000 in
First Bank Plc and $5m in Access Bank Plc .
After ordering the temporary forfeiture of the monies to the
Federal Government on Friday, Justice Hassan gave Sterling
Bank and any other interested party 14 days to appear before
him to prove the legitimacy of the monies, failure of which the
funds would be permanently forfeited to the Federal
Government.
The judge made the order in favour of the Economic and
Financial Crimes Commission which appeared before him on
Friday with an ex parte application seeking the temporary
forfeiture of the funds .
In a nine - paragraph affidavit filed in support of the ex parte
application, an EFCC investigator , Moses Awolusi , claimed that
the anti- graft agency discovered through its investigations how
sometime in December 2014 Diezani, in collusion with a bank
chief executive , hatched the plan on how a cash sum of
$153 , 310, 000 would be moved from the NNPC .
According to Awolusi , Diezani instructed the bank boss to
ensure that the money was “neither credited into any known
account nor captured in any transaction platforms .
Awolusi said the deal was accepted and implemented , leading
to the movement of $153 , 310, 000 from NNPC .
He said two former Group Executive Directors of Finance and
Account of NNPC , B . O . N . Otti and Stanley Lawson, helped
Diezani to move the cash from NNPC , Abuja to the
headquarters of Fidelity Bank in Lagos .
Awolusi said in a desperate bid to conceal the source of the
money , the Country Head of the bank, Mr . Martin Izuogbe,
was instructed to take $113 ,310 , 000 cash out of the money
to the Executive Director, Commercial and Institutional Bank,
Sterling Bank Plc , Lanre Adesanya , to keep.
He said the remaining $40 m was taken in cash to the
Executive Director , Public Sector Accountant , First Bank,
Dauda Lawal, to keep.
The investigator said out of the $ 113, 310 ,000 handed over to
Adesanya , a sum of $ 108, 310 ,000 was invested in an off
balance sheet investment using Sterling Asset Management
Trustees Limited.
He said the $108, 310 , 000 was subsequently changed to N 23,
446 , 300, 000 and saved in Sterling Bank.
Awolusi said the EFCC had recovered the N 23. 4 bn in draft
and had registered it as an exhibit marked , EFCC 01.
The investigator said the EFCC had also recovered another
$5m out of the money kept with the MD of Access Bank Plc ,
Mr. Herbert Wigwe.
He said the $ 5m was recovered in draft and had been
registered as an exhibit marked , EFCC 02 .
According to him , First Bank ’s ED , Lawal, had converted the
$40 m kept with him to N 9, 080 , 000, 000 .
Awolusi , however, said the EFCC had recovered that also in
draft and registered it as Exhibit EFCC 03.
Moving the ex parte application on Friday, the EFCC lawyer ,
Mr. Rotimi Oyedepo , urged Justice Hassan to order the
temporary forfeiture of the funds to the Federal Government
and to order Sterling Bank and Lawal, who were joined as
defendants in the application, as well as any other interested
parties , to appear in court within two weeks to show cause
why the funds should not be permanently forfeited to the
Federal Government.
Punchngr
Oyedepo, who said the application was brought pursuant to
Section 17 of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Related
Offences Act No. 14, 2006 and Section 44( 2)(‘) of the 1999
Constitution , said granting the application was in the best
interest of justice.
After hearing him out, Justice Hassan granted the order and
adjourned till January 24, 2017 for the respondents to appear
in court to show cause why the funds should not be
permanently forfeited to the Federal Government.
No comments:
Post a Comment