The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, insistence and public criticism of the United Kingdom on its refusal to extradite former Petroleum Minister, Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke, is said to be ruffling diplomatic feathers in the relationship between Abuja and London.
\nUK continues to resist the Nigerian government’s pressure to send her home for trial for alleged economic and\u00a0 financial offences
\nBut the international community is said to be watching the delay and clumsiness in handling other high profile cases like that of former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke, which after four years the government appeared not too ready to commence.
\nThe EFCC had to ask for an extra four weeks to keep Adoke, after his return from self-imposed exile, for further investigation. On his planned arraignment day on Wednesday, charges were not brought forward, forcing a day’s adjournment.
\nAdoke’s\u00a0 trial finally begins as EFCC continues to goad the UK government to\u00a0 try in court or send back Diezani for trial, in the delicate diplomatic tussle between a former colonial master and former colony.
\nRecall that President Muhammadu Buhari has often engaged the UK and expressed frustration at every turn over the non-repatriation of stolen wealth by western countries. He is on his way back from London where he went for a UK- Africa conference. Curiously, the UK government has often granted “safe passage” to Buhari for medical treatment in that country.
\nBut all that does not impress EFCC’s\u00a0 Ibrahim Magu who is fixated on Allison-Madueke’s extradition.
\nMagu on Monday decried the refusal of the United Kingdom (UK), to extradite Allison-Madueke, to face trial for alleged money laundering in Nigeria.
\nThe EFCC boss disclosed that the Commission had sufficient evidence to prosecute Allison-Madueke for the alleged financial malfeasance she committed while in office. The looted funds, traced to Allison-Madueke and others, he noted, could be used to keep the wheel of the nation\u2019s economy rolling if recovered.
\n\u201cWe don\u2019t want to keep chasing everybody as a suspect. We want everybody who has stolen from the commonwealth to bring it back to Nigeria, so as to use the monies to provide the needed infrastructure,\u201d he stated, disclosing that the Commission would build more detention facilities and open additional zonal offices so as to bring the anti-corruption fight, nearer home to the people.
\nBut on Thursday, Adoke was arraigned before Justice A.I. Kutigi of Federal Capital Territory High Court, Abuja.
\nHe is facing an amended 42-count charge. He is being tried alongside Aliyu Abubakar, Mr. Rasky Gbinigie, Malabu Oil and Gas Ltd, Nigeria Agip Exploration, Shell Nigeria Ultra Deep Ltd and Shell Nigeria Exploration Production.
\nAdoke is accused of using public office for gratification, an offence contrary to and punishable under Section 115(a) of the Panel Code, Cap. 532 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria (Abuja)1990 and punishable under Section 115(i) of the same Penal Code.
\nEFCC counsel, Bala Sanga stated that\u00a0the matter was for arraignment and subject to the convenience of the court applied that the charges be read to the defendants.\u00a0\u00a0According to him, \u201cWe have on 14\/01\/2020 filed a forty-two count charge. However, we filed an amended charge dated 23\/01\/2020 and filed on the same date.\u00a0My lord, we only amended, but we can confirm the proof of evidence, and subject to the convenience of the court we are applying\u00a0 for the charge to be read to them.\u201d
\nCount one of the charges reads: \u201cThat you, Muhammed Bello Adoke, while being a public servant, as attorney-general and minister of Justice of the federation, sometime in August 2013, within the jurisdiction of this honourable court, accepted from Aliyu Abubakar for yourself a gratification of US dollars equivalent of N300,000,000.00 (Three Hundred Million Naira) only other than lawful remuneration, as a motive for facilitating\u00a0 and negotiating the Block 245 Resolution Agreement with Shell Nigeria Ultra Deep Limited, Nigeria Agip Exploration Limited, and Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company Limited, and thereby committed an offence contrary to and punishable under Section 115(a) of the Penal Code, Cap. 532 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria (Abuja)1990 and punishable under Section 115(i) of the same Penal Code.\u201d
\nHe pleaded not guilty to all the charges.
\nIn view of the plea, Sanga applied to the court to remand the first, second and third defendants in the custody of the Nigerian Correctional Services.
\nThe first, second and third defence counsels, however, applied for bail of their clients, which was opposed to by the prosecution.
\nSanga said: \u201cI can confirm that they served us the application for bail. I will move to oppose the bail because it is premature, I need time.
\n“For the third defendant, we were served at 2:54pm, for the second, we were served at 2:03pm, for the first it was about 3:15pm yesterday, all of them yesterday.\u201d
\nHe therefore requested for time to respond to their bail application.
\nDefence counsel, Mike Ozekhome, SAN, however, urged the\u00a0 court to keep all the defendents in the custody of the EFCC instead of the correctional service. The third defence counsel adopted the position of the first and second defence counsel.
\nThe second defence counsel, afterwards, sought for a five minutes stand down, and when the court resumed, the second defence counsel told the court that both the defence and the\u00a0 prosecution had agreed that the defendants will be kept in the custody of the EFCC.
\nJustice Kutigi, therefore, ordered that they should be remanded in the custody of the EFCC and adjourned the case to January 27, 2020 for hearing on the bail application.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, insistence and public criticism of the United Kingdom on its refusal to extradite former Petroleum Minister, Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke, is said to be ruffling diplomatic feathers in the relationship between Abuja and London. UK continues to resist the Nigerian government’s pressure to send her home for trial for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23985\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}