EFCC arraigns ex-NDDC ED for alleged N3.6bn bribery

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission on Thursday
arraigned a former Executive Director, Projects, Niger Delta
Development Commission, Mr Tuoyo Omatsuli, for allegedly receiving
a bribe of N3.6bn from a contractor.

Omatsuli was arrainged alongside Don Parker Properties Limited,
Francis Momoh and Building Associates Limited before the Federal
High Court in Lagos.

The defendants were arraigned on 45 counts before Justice Saliu
Saidu.

In one of the counts, Omatsuli was accused of conspiring with
the others “to disguise the illegal origin of a total sum of
N3,645,000,000, being proceeds of an unlawful activity, to wit:
corruption and gratification.”

The prosecuting counsel for the EFCC, Ekene Iheanacho, said the
defendants committed the offence between August 2014 and September
2015 in Lagos.

He told the court that they acted contrary to Section 18 of the
Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act No. 1 of 2012 and were liable to
be punished under Section 15 (3) of the same Act.

But when the charges were read to them, the defendants pleaded
not guilty.

Justice Saidu adjourned till November 16, 2018 to take their
bail applications.

He ordered that they should be remanded in the custody of the
EFCC till then.

The EFCC had in May this year obtained a forfeiture order on
Omatsuli’s four landed properties valued at N846.03m.

The anti-graft agency had told Justice Chuka Obiozor who granted
the forfeiture order that the properties were reasonably suspected
to have been acquired with proceeds of unlawful activities.

In an affidavit deposed to by one of its investigators, Adamu
Yusuf, the EFCC claimed that Omatsuli received a bribe of
N3,645,000,000 from a consultant to the NDDC, Starline Consultancy
Services Limited.

“That Mr Omatsuli agreed and received kickbacks to the tune of
N3,645,000,000.000 from Starline Consultancy Services Limited
through Building Associates Limited, whose alter ego is Francis
Momoh (an ally of Mr. Omatsuli),” Yusuf said.