Judge orders forfeiture of N34b linked to Diezani

Justice Muslim Hassan, of the Federal High Court, Lagos has ordered the final forfeiture of about N34 billion linked to former petroleum minister, Diezani Alison-Madueke.
An interim forfeiture order was issued on the funds on January 6 for the sum of $153,310,000, which the former Minister allegedly siphoned from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and stashed in three banks in the country.
The EFCC surmised that out of the allegedly stolen $153.3m, a sum of N23,446, 300,000 was said to have been kept in Sterling Bank Plc, N9,080,000,000 in First Bank Plc and $5m in Access Bank Plc.
Moses Awolusi, an EFCC investigator in a nine-paragraph affidavit filed in support of the ex parte application, claimed that the anti-graft agency discovered through its investigations that around 2014 Diezani conspired with Nnamdi Okonkwo, a former managing director of Fidelity Bank Plc to move the funds from NNPC.
The judge said he was satisfied with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission’s (EFCC) argument that the monies were proceeds of illegal activity.
Recall that on January 24, Justice Hassan had fixed February 16 to hear arguments from counsels representing parties in the suit after issuing an interim order of forfeiture of the sum of $153.3 million to the Federal Government, following an exparte application by EFCC seeking similar relief.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission had initiated the exparte application seeking an interim order, for the temporary forfeiture to the FG, of the sum, which it claims is linked to Alison-Madueke.
The court had also issued 14 days to any interested party including Sterling Bank to appear and prove the legitimacy of the monies, failing which the funds would be permanently forfeited to the federal government.
Last month, Alison-Madueke denounced the EFCC over allegations of corruption levelled against her.
The former petroleum minister also faulted President Buhari’s war on corruption saying that it is aimed at rubbishing the image of Nigerians who were not in the good books of the APC-led government.
“The fight against corruption in Nigeria will be far better served if the EFCC focused on incontrovertible facts, as opposed to media sensationalism and completely distorted stories, in its bid to demonise and destroy a few specially chosen Nigerians,” she stated.
Alison-Madueke fed into popular discontent over EFCC’s alleged media trials saying that the financial crimes agency sensationalised the story of her estates in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State which she said was a family house declared in her Asset Declaration form with the Code of Conduct Bureau.