Former Director of Media and Publicity, campaign committee of ex President<\/p>\n
Goodluck Jonathan and former Aviation Minister, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode,
\nwas, Friday, re-arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission,
\nEFCC, after he stepped out of a court room at Federal High Court sitting
\nin Lagos, where he is standing trial.<\/p>\n
Fani-Kayode, was charged alongside a former Minister of Finance, Nenandi
\nUsman, Danjuma Yusuf and a company, Joint Trust Dimension Nig. Ltd., on a
\n17 count charge of unlawful retention, unlawful use and unlawful payment
\nof money in the tune of about N4.9 billion, aa charge brought against them
\nby the EFCC.
\nThey all pleaded not guilty to the charge and were granted bail.
\nYesterday, the prosecutor, Mr Rotimi Oyedepo, opened its case and had
\nwrapped up the witness\u2019 evidence for the day, while the court adjourned
\nthe case to November 14 and 15, 2016, for continuation of trial and rose.<\/p>\n
However, shortly after Fani-Kayode had walked out of court, two officers
\nof the EFCC dressed in white kaftan, flanked his sides, and requested that
\nhe followed them to the commission\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
Immediately, the court\u2019s gate was barricaded by a toyota Hiace bus and
\nFani-Kayode was taken off to the EFCC.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Friday, EFCC had opened its case for the prosecution and called
\nits first witness, a Media consultant, Mr Idowu Olusegun. Led him in
\nevidence, the witness, who is media consultant, Paste Posters Company Ltd,
\ntold the court that N30 million was paid in cash to him, by the office of
\nthe Director of media and publicity, PDP campaign Organisation.<\/p>\n
According to Olusegun, he had reached an agreement with the organisation
\nwhose office is situated at 14B, Samora Micheal Avenue, Asokoro, Abuja,
\nfor the sum of N24m for media consultancy services.<\/p>\n
He said that a further negotiation was reached in which N50 would be paid
\nfor each size of A2 posters, while N20 would be paid for each size of A4
\nflyers.<\/p>\n
The witness told the court that after the printing job for the posters and
\nflyers was done, he was invited to the office of the organisation and
\ngiven N30 million in cash.<\/p>\n
He further told the court that he had demanded to know why payments was
\nmade in cash and was informed by one Mr Oke, that cash was the approved
\nmeans of payment. He said that Mr Oke had been the person communicating
\nwith him throughout the pendency of his engagement to do the media jobs.<\/p>\n
The witness added that apart from the N30 million paid to him, there was
\nalso an outstanding payment of N24m which was not paid to his company.
\nAfter his testimony and based on agreements of counsel, the court fixed
\nNovember 14 and 15 for continuation of trial.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, a mild drama played out in court during trial, when the trial
\njudge, Justice Sule Hassan, ordered the seizure of the mobile phone of
\nFani-kayode. The accused had held his phones and suddenly, the phone rang
\nout loud and the judge asked: \u201cWho is doing that?\u201d He ordered the court\u2019s
\nregistrar to seize the phones.<\/p>\n
Similarly, the trial judge also issued a warning to counsel representing
\nthe accused, when he sighted him sipping from a bottle water during
\nproceedings. The judge had warned counsel to seek the permission of the
\ncourt, whenever, his client was pressed for water.<\/p>\n
According to Hassan \u201cThe court is not a market place, there must be order
\nand sanity.\u201d In the charge, the accused were alleged to have committed the
\noffences between January and March 2015.<\/p>\n
In counts one to seven, they were alleged to have unlawfully retained over
\nN3.8 billion which they reasonably ought to have known formed part of the
\nproceeds of an unlawful act of stealing and corruption.<\/p>\n
In counts eight to 14, the accused were alleged to have unlawfully used
\nover N970 million which they reasonably ought to have known formed part of
\nan unlawful act of corruption.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former Director of Media and Publicity, campaign committee of ex President Goodluck Jonathan and former Aviation Minister, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, was, Friday, re-arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50803,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exclusive"],"yoast_head":"\n