Justice C.A. Balogun of a Lagos State High Court sitting in Ikeja, on
\nFebruary 2, 2021 admitted in evidence more documents against Abubakar
\nAli Peters, and his company, Nadabo Energy who are both standing trial
\nfor an alleged N1.4 billion oil subsidy fraud.<\/p>\n
Peters and his company are being prosecuted by the Economic and
\nFinancial Crimes Commission, EFCC for allegedly using forged documents
\nto obtain N1, 464,961,978.24 from the Federal Government as oil subsidy
\nafter allegedly inflating the quantity of premium motor spirit, PMS
\npurportedly supplied to 14,000MT.<\/p>\n
They pleaded “not guilty” to the charge preferred against them.<\/p>\n
At today’s sitting, Justice Balogun admitted in evidence, four
\ndocuments, which the prosecuting counsel, S.K. Atteh on January 26, 2021
\nsought to tender against the defendant through the prosecution witness,
\nAbdulrasheed Bawa.<\/p>\n
Bawa had identified two investigation activities letters written to
\nStaco Insurance in the course of investigating the alleged fraud, and
\nalso the responses received from the Insurance Company. The witness had
\nalleged that the Certificate of marine insurance used by the defendant
\nfor the transaction in question was forged.<\/p>\n
But, the defence raised objection to the “tendering and admissibility”
\nof the documents.<\/p>\n
However, Justice Balogun overruled the objection and admitted the
\nletters from the EFCC to Staco Insurance as Exhibit M1 and M2, and the
\nresponse from Staco Insurance along with its attachment (including the
\noriginal certificate of insurance) as Exhibit M3 and M4.<\/p>\n
Continuing with his testimony, Bawa told the Court that “the value on
\nthe forged documents states that the amount to be insured based on the
\ncargo was $17,205,000 (United States Dollar).”<\/p>\n
According to Bawa, “the real certificate of marine insurance as
\nindicated in exhibit M3 which has same insurance number 0047851 with
\nsame date of 25th October 2011 was for $4,780,128 (United States
\nDollar), which is the value of the actual importation of 4,800 MT by the
\ndefendant”.<\/p>\n
Testifying further, Bawa told the Court that in the course of
\ninvestigation, “we interviewed a gentleman, Ullrich Afini Awani of
\nGlobal Commodities Africa who happened to be the African agent of Sea
\nTanker based in France and who are the owners of MT St Vanessa, the
\ndaughter vessel used by the defendant.”<\/p>\n
He further revealed that Awani confirmed that “one Mr. Jide Ofor Akpan
\nwas the broker of the said vessel during the said transaction”.<\/p>\n
Thereafter, the prosecution sought to tender the email correspondence
\nbetween the witness and Awani along with a certificate of
\nidentification.<\/p>\n
The defence, led by E.O. Isiramen, holding the brief of J.B. Daudu, SAN,
\nhowever raised objection to the admissibility of the documents.<\/p>\n
The case has been adjourned till February 10, 16, 23 and March 9, 2021
\nfor “continuation of hearing”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Justice C.A. Balogun of a Lagos State High Court sitting in Ikeja, on February 2, 2021 admitted in evidence more documents against Abubakar Ali Peters, and his company, Nadabo Energy…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":78119,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-other-news"],"yoast_head":"\n