Badeh instructed me to front for his N1.8bn property – Witness

Mustapha Yerima, Managing Director of Right Builders Nigeria Limited has testified before Justice Okon Abang of an Abuja Federal High Court, how he was instructed by the former Chief of Air Staff, Alex Badeh, to front for his uncompleted property.

Yerima who is the fourth prosecution witness in the matter brought before the court against the Badeh, by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), told the court while being led in evidence by Rotimi Jacobs SAN, that when he was invited by the EFCC as regards, the shopping mall he was contracted to build for Badeh, he was “instructed” to claim ownership of the property.

“We continued our work after payments were made until one fateful morning, one of the site supervisors called me that the EFCC operatives are looking for me. Immediately I drove down to the site, they asked if the property belongs to Dasuki, I told them I have never seen or met Dasuki.

“I was asked to report to their office by 3pm, before I got to their office, I called Air Commodore Ishau (former director of finance at the Nigerian Air force), to tell him what happened.

“He panicked, that since he has handed over the project to the original owner, and it was Alex Badeh jnr that was coordinating that i should call him, I did call him, he told me that his father was not around but that I should call Ishau back.

“After I spoke with Badeh junior, he said he had discussed with Ishau and he will give me directives on what to tell the EFCC operatives. Ishau told me that since we are into property development as a company, I should claim the property because he was scared”, he stated.

He confirmed that Badeh was still the legitimate owner of the property as at the time of being invited by the EFCC.

He said one Timothy Muje, Badeh’s lawyer called him that they should meet somewhere around Wuse 2, according to him, they met and he was handed over some of the property documents to him, including the original certificate of occupancy, deed and power of attorney between Ayodele Fayose and one Tony, power of attorney and deed between Tony  and Cassagro Investment, deed of assignment and power of attorney he signed between Cassagro investment and Right Builders.

Yerima however said he was deliberately not given the power of attorney and deed of assignment between Right Builders and other company, because the whole idea was for me to claim the property as agreed between Ishau, Badeh junior and Muje.

“But when I got to EFCC, it was a different ball game because i was confronted with some chilly evidences. I was confronted with so many documents such as copies of drawing, bill of quantity, statement of accounts and so many other documents including email correspondences, at that point I had no option but to tell EFCC exactly the way this were. I told them everything that transpired.

“The approximate cost of the shopping mall is about N1.8billion including cost of the land, since the EFCC visited the site, they told us to stay off it because it is still under investigation”, he said.

Meanwhile, Yerima had earlier explained how Badeh bought the land belonging to the Ekiti State governor, Ayodele Fayose for N650 million, which he got to know about during a negotiation with a company, Kasamgo Investment for the purchase of a land, where his company would construct a mall for Badeh.

Yerima explained that it all started in 2013 when he found out about the plan of the Nigerian Air Force to engage the services of contractors for the construction of a mall, for the helms man at the Air Force.

According to him, at the time of the negotiotiation however, the said land had been sold off, by Fayose and that the buyer had also sold it to a third party.

The witness stated that they bidded for the land with its last owner and decided to buy at the cost of N650 million.

Ishau was said to have given them N650million in dollar equivalent, because the owners of Kasamgo investment had insisted on cash payment. After the purchase, Yerima said he asked about the name to be used for the documentation of the land, and was told to use the name of his company.

The matter was however adjourned to June 14, 15, 16, 2016 for cross examination of the witness, after the prosecuting sought for an adjournment as a result of the second additional statement of evidence made by the witness to EFCC, which was just filed before the court.