By Abiola Olawale
The corruption allegations leveled against the immediate past Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), keep racking up as fresh revelations emerged at the court trial on Monday.
A prosecution witness who appeared before the Federal High Court in Abuja revealed that Emefiele allegedly helped facilitate over 45 contracts to his family members, and associates.
The witness identified as Agboro Michael, an Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) investigator, told the court that investigations revealed that Emefiele’s wife, Margaret Emefiele, and one of his associates, a CBN employee, identified as Sa’adatu Ramalan Yero, enjoyed receiving several contracts running to the tune of billions of Naira.
Giving specific details, Michael identified April 1616 Investment Limited, owned by Sa’adatu Ramalan Yero as one of the two beneficiaries of the slew of contracts.
According to the witness, the other is Architekon Nigeria Limited, owned by Emefiele’s wife. One of Margaret’s brothers was also said to have benefitted from some of the contracts.
The witness told the court that the inter-agency investigation involving the ICPC, EFCC, Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), and the State Security Service (SSS) showed that the contracts were awarded by Emefiele to confer corrupt advantages on the beneficiaries.
“My Lord, these companies were awarded about 45 contracts to supply Toyota Vehicles. We were worried as investigators as to how a particular company would get bids concurrently to supply vehicles. We did our investigation and discovered that the company was not even accredited by Toyota,” Michael said in his testimony as the seventh prosecution.
“In the companies, my Lord, one has Sa’adatu’s husband and siblings as directors, and the other one has Sa’adatu as the director of the company while she is still a civil servant.”
The New Diplomat reports that Emefiele, the governor of the CBN for nearly a decade, has been facing corruption charges preferred against him after President Bola Tinubu removed him from office last June.
He is being prosecuted on amended 20 counts of conferment of corrupt advantages, conspiracy, criminal breach of trust, forgery, and obtaining by false pretense to the tune of $6.23 million.
