Justice M. S. Hassan of the Federal High Court, Lagos, has ordered two former ministers, Femi Fani-Kayode and Nenadi Esther Usman, to be remanded in prison custody.
The court ruling followed their arraignment on Tuesday by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for alleged fraud of N4.9 billion.
Usman, who served as Minister of Finance, was the Director of Finance of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) Presidential Campaign Organisation while Fani-Kayode, a former Minister of Aviation, was the Director Media/Publicity of the PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation.
Others arraigned with them on a 17-count charge bordering on conspiracy, stealing, corruption and making cash payments exceeding the amount authorised by law were Danjuma Yusuf and Jointrust Dimentions Nigeria Limited.
According to the EFCC, the accused allegedly stole and illegally disbursed about N4.9 billion belonging to the Federal Government for political and personal uses.
All the defendants pleaded not guilty to all the charges preferred against them, which made Justice Hassan to order that they be remanded in prison custody until their applications for bail were filed and argued.
Two of the charges read: “That you, Nenadi Esther Usman, Femi Fani-Kayode, Danjuma Yusuf and Jointrust Dimentions Nigeria Limited on or about the 8th day of January, 2015, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, conspired amongst yourselves to indirectly retain the sum of N1,500, 000,000 which sum you reasonably ought to have known forms part of the proceeds of an unlawful act to wit: stealing, and you thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 18(a) of the Money Laundering (Prohibition) (Amendment) Act, 2012 and punishable under Section15(3) & 4 of the same Act.
“That you, Nenadi Esther Usman, Femi Fani-Kayode, Danjuma Yusuf and Jointrust Dimentions Nigeria Limited on or about the 9th day of January, 2015, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court indirectly retained the sum of N300,000,000 which sum you reasonably ought to have known form part of the proceeds of an unlawful act to wit: corruption, and you thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 15(2)(d) of the Money Laundering (Prohibition) (Amendment) Act, 2012 and punishable under Section 15(3) & 4 of the same Act...”
The prosecuting counsel, Mr. Rotimi Oyedepo, asked that the trial should commence immediately, adding that the case be given accelerated hearing.
But counsel to the accused: Fred Orbih (SAN), Ifedayo Adedipe (SAN) and S. I. Ameh (SAN) for first, second and third accused persons respectively, told the court of their applications for bail.
Rotimi, however, said he needed time to respond to the applications and urged Justice Hassan to remand the defendants in prison custody, pending the consideration of the bail applications.
Consequently, Justice Hassan ruled that “since the prosecution was only served bail application yesterday, and in the interest of justice, it will be fair if the prosecution is given the opportunity to respond.”
He therefore ordered that the defendants be remanded in prison custody and adjourned the case till Friday for hearing of the bail applications.
Meanwhile, the trial of Azibaola Roberts, a cousin of former President Goodluck Jonathan, in the alleged $40 million money laundering criminal charge, began yesterday in Abuja.
A Federal Government witness, Mr. Ibrahim Mahe, testified at the Federal High Court in Abuja that the former National Security Adviser (NSA), Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd), instructed him to prepare a payment mandate of $40 million in favour of One Plus Limited.
Dasuki was the National Security Adviser (NSA) in the immediate past administration while One Plus Limited is owned by Roberts.
Roberts and his wife, Stella, were arraigned on June 8, 2016 on a seven-count charge bordering on money laundering totalling about $40 million.
Mahe, who was the first witness called by the prosecution, told the court that Dasuki had endorsed a memo to him with details of the company’s account.
He said the memo was sent to him in his capacity as the Permanent Secretary, Special Service Office, a department in the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation.
“On Aug. 20, 2014, the NSA endorsed a memo to me which originated from the Director of Finance and Administration in the office of the NSA giving bank details of a company called One Plus”.
“The memo also gave details of the purpose for which the company was to be paid the sum of 40 million dollars”.
“The NSA instructed me to prepare payment and my understanding of that was that I should prepare the payment mandate for One Plus for his signature”.
“After I got the memo, I prepared the payment mandate, sent it to him; he signed and sent it back to me.
“The subsequent necessary action was for me to counter-sign, which I did and I sent it to the CBN for payment,” Mahe said.
Earlier, the lead counsel to Roberts, Chief Chris Uche (SAN) had urged the court for a short adjournment.
Uche said he sought for the adjournment because he had not had ample time to meet with his client since he was granted bail to prepare his defence.
He said that when bail was granted, his team had difficulties in perfecting the bail conditions, adding that the conditions were only perfected last week.
He said they needed more time to prepare their defence because there were some documents that they needed to subpoena from the office of the NSA.
Uche also sighted indisposition as part of the reasons his team was asking for an adjournment.
The prosecuting counsel, Mr. Sylvanus Tahir, however, objected to the application on the grounds that they had a witness already in court who was stopped from going on lesser hajj on account of the trial.
Tahir said that they had prevailed on the witness to postpone his trip and not allowing him to give his testimony would amount to a waste of effort.
On the issue of indisposition, Tahir said the defence had about 19 other lawyers on the team and so even without the lead counsel, trial could commence.
The trial judge, Justice Nnamdi Dimgba, agreed with the prosecution that the trial should commence since the defence had sufficient time to prepare their defence.
Justice Dimgba adjourned the case till July 4 and 5 for continuation of the trial.
Wednesday, 29 June 2016
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Court remands Fani-Kayode, Nenadi Usman in prison over ALLEGED N4.9BN FRAUD
Court remands Fani-Kayode, Nenadi Usman in prison over ALLEGED N4.9BN FRAUD
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