Four companies linked to Patience Jonathan’s $15m plead guilty to money laundering charges

Four companies charged alongside a former Special Adviser to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, on Domestic Affairs, Waripamo Dudafa, with charges bordering on money laundering, on Thursday, pleaded guilty before a Lagos Federal High Court.

The four companies, Pluto Property and Investment Company Limited; Seagate Property Development & Investment Co. Limited; Trans Ocean Property and Investment Company Limited and Development Company Limited and Avalon Global Property Development Company Limited were arraigned by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, for charges bordering on money laundering.

At the hearing of the matter, all four companies pleaded guilty to conspiring with the former President’s aide and two others to launder the sum of $15, 591,700. Recall that the anti-graft agency had recently seized the sum of $15.6m found in a Sky Bank account which was linked to the four companies.

The seized sum was, however, claimed by the wife of the former President, Mrs Patience Jonathan.
Mrs Jonathan had explained that the seized sum was meant for her hospital bills abroad.

Details later…

-DP

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Sambo Dasuki pleads “not guilty” to money laundering charge

Nigeria’s former national security adviser pleaded not guilty to money laundering Monday in connection with $423,000 in US dollars and Nigerian naira seized at his homes. Col. Mohammed Sambo Dasuki also denied charges of illegal possession of an arms cache including assault rifles and a submachine gun found when security agents raided his homes in Abuja, the capital, and the northern city of Sokoto in July. 

The raids came as Dasuki was trying to resign and Nigeria’s new president demanded an accounting before he could go. Dasuki, 60, was a key adviser to former President Goodluck Jonathan and had taken control of weapons procurement from the Ministry of Defense.

Nigeria’s new President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered an investigation into military purchases since 2007 in his campaign to curb corruption and ensure the armed forces are properly equipped to fight Boko Haram’s six-year-old Islamic uprising that has killed 20,000 people.

A national newspaper on Monday ran a column accusing Buhari of a “sheer witch hunt” and saying Dasuki is “a victim of political persecution.”

One of Buhari’s spokesmen, Garba Shehu, has accused Dasuki of plotting a coup against Buhari during March elections. Shehu called it Dasuki’s second coup against Buhari, referring to the colonel’s alleged arrest of Buhari during the 1985 palace coup that ended Buhari’s brief tenure as a military dictator.

- AP

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Sambo Dasuki pleads “not guilty” to money laundering charge

Nigeria’s former national security adviser pleaded not guilty to money laundering Monday in connection with $423,000 in US dollars and Nigerian naira seized at his homes. Col. Mohammed Sambo Dasuki also denied charges of illegal possession of an arms cache including assault rifles and a submachine gun found when security agents raided his homes in Abuja, the capital, and the northern city of Sokoto in July. 

The raids came as Dasuki was trying to resign and Nigeria’s new president demanded an accounting before he could go. Dasuki, 60, was a key adviser to former President Goodluck Jonathan and had taken control of weapons procurement from the Ministry of Defense.

Nigeria’s new President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered an investigation into military purchases since 2007 in his campaign to curb corruption and ensure the armed forces are properly equipped to fight Boko Haram’s six-year-old Islamic uprising that has killed 20,000 people.

A national newspaper on Monday ran a column accusing Buhari of a “sheer witch hunt” and saying Dasuki is “a victim of political persecution.”

One of Buhari’s spokesmen, Garba Shehu, has accused Dasuki of plotting a coup against Buhari during March elections. Shehu called it Dasuki’s second coup against Buhari, referring to the colonel’s alleged arrest of Buhari during the 1985 palace coup that ended Buhari’s brief tenure as a military dictator.

- AP

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How N3.7bn UK house put former minister, Diezani in trouble

Former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke and a former Managing Director of a parastatal under the NNPC got themselves into trouble with the police in the United Kingdom. According Punch report, the purchase of houses each in London by the former minister and the sacked NNPC top shot had sent the police investigators after them since 2013.

Alison-Madueke and the ex-MD had bought a house each in London through a mortgage but the two were said to have attracted suspicion when they offered to pay huge sum to clear the mortgage on the properties. A source said the ex-minister’s house cost £12.5m. The source was however silent on the cost of the house bought by the former MD of the subsidiary of the NNPC.

It was learnt that the UK’s National Crimes Agency had dispatched a team to Abuja for an investigation into the incomes of the affected public officers because of the huge amount of money that was being paid steadily to defray the amount on the mortgage.

The source explained that the police suspected that the mortgaged London properties might have been serviced with laundered money from the Government of Nigeria. The source said, “This particular investigation did not originate from Nigeria. I can tell you that this is different from the investigation being conducted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission into the financial operations of the NNPC under Alison-Madueke.

“This is a strictly UK investigation and it has to do with the procurement of a property in the UK for £12.5m through a mortgage arrangement in London.

“The UK authorities became suspicious when they realised that the agreed monthly amount for the mortgage was too high for the income of a public official without other sources of income.

“You know the (UK) people; they kept quiet when the whole arrangement was going on in 2013. They allowed the funds to go into their economy before they moved in against them with the intent to seize the properties.

“She was not the only person that bought the properties. The other guy, a close ally from the NNPC also bought a house in London. These are the issues the UK police are investigating.”

The investigation, which commenced in 2013 climaxed Friday last week with the arrest of Alison-Madueke and four others by the UK police for alleged fraud. The EFCC raided the residence of the ex-minister at Asokoro same day she was arrested in the UK.

Although the raid did not yield any huge financial recovery contrary to media reports, the operatives from the Subsidy Unit of the EFCC carted away several documents from the residence. The EFCC operatives, who insisted that only N1.2m was recovered from the Asokoro residence of the minister, said that the files moved away from her house were being analysed.

When contacted, the spokesperson for the EFCC, Mr. Wilson Uwujaren, on Monday declined to comment on the Alison-Madueke saga. Uwujaren said he did not know anything about the ex-minister’s case.

Meanwhile, the British National Crime Agency on Monday obtained court permission to temporarily seize £27,000 (N8.078m) from a former petroleum resources minister, Diezani Alison-Madueke, Reuters reports.

-Punch

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How N3.7bn UK house put former minister, Diezani in trouble

Former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke and a former Managing Director of a parastatal under the NNPC got themselves into trouble with the police in the United Kingdom. According Punch report, the purchase of houses each in London by the former minister and the sacked NNPC top shot had sent the police investigators after them since 2013.

Alison-Madueke and the ex-MD had bought a house each in London through a mortgage but the two were said to have attracted suspicion when they offered to pay huge sum to clear the mortgage on the properties. A source said the ex-minister’s house cost £12.5m. The source was however silent on the cost of the house bought by the former MD of the subsidiary of the NNPC.

It was learnt that the UK’s National Crimes Agency had dispatched a team to Abuja for an investigation into the incomes of the affected public officers because of the huge amount of money that was being paid steadily to defray the amount on the mortgage.

The source explained that the police suspected that the mortgaged London properties might have been serviced with laundered money from the Government of Nigeria. The source said, “This particular investigation did not originate from Nigeria. I can tell you that this is different from the investigation being conducted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission into the financial operations of the NNPC under Alison-Madueke.

“This is a strictly UK investigation and it has to do with the procurement of a property in the UK for £12.5m through a mortgage arrangement in London.

“The UK authorities became suspicious when they realised that the agreed monthly amount for the mortgage was too high for the income of a public official without other sources of income.

“You know the (UK) people; they kept quiet when the whole arrangement was going on in 2013. They allowed the funds to go into their economy before they moved in against them with the intent to seize the properties.

“She was not the only person that bought the properties. The other guy, a close ally from the NNPC also bought a house in London. These are the issues the UK police are investigating.”

The investigation, which commenced in 2013 climaxed Friday last week with the arrest of Alison-Madueke and four others by the UK police for alleged fraud. The EFCC raided the residence of the ex-minister at Asokoro same day she was arrested in the UK.

Although the raid did not yield any huge financial recovery contrary to media reports, the operatives from the Subsidy Unit of the EFCC carted away several documents from the residence. The EFCC operatives, who insisted that only N1.2m was recovered from the Asokoro residence of the minister, said that the files moved away from her house were being analysed.

When contacted, the spokesperson for the EFCC, Mr. Wilson Uwujaren, on Monday declined to comment on the Alison-Madueke saga. Uwujaren said he did not know anything about the ex-minister’s case.

Meanwhile, the British National Crime Agency on Monday obtained court permission to temporarily seize £27,000 (N8.078m) from a former petroleum resources minister, Diezani Alison-Madueke, Reuters reports.

-Punch

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