The
absence of a Lagos based lawyer, Mr. Fred Ajudua from court, yesterday,
prevented his fresh arraignment before an Ikeja High Court for
allegedly defrauding ex- Chief of Army Staff, COAS, Major General Ishaya
Bamaiyi of the sum of $8.395m (N1.2bn) while he was in prison.
Expected,
Ajudua was to be arraigned on a 13-count charge of conspiracy and fraud
alongside Elumile Adedeji (a.k.a Ade Bendel), Kenneth and Princess
Hamabon William now at large.
Ajudua alongside other suspects
allegedly defrauded Bamaiyi at the Kirikiri Maximum Prisons, where he
and the other fraud suspects were remanded.
Ajudua, currently
answering various charges bordering on advanced fee fraud pressed
against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC,
according to his lawyer, Richard Ahonaruogho, was absent because he was
only aware of the matter on Saturday, adding that his client was ill.
The
anti-graft agency also alleged that Ajudua and others fraudulently
claimed that $1m out of the total money collected from Bamaiyi was for
financial assistance for the treatment of Justice Olubunmi Oyewole’s
father, who was handling Bamaiyi’s case then.
Also, the former
COAS, was said to have parted with the money in foreign currency to also
bribe some eminent personalities to intervene in his case where he was
charged alongside Major Hamza Al-Mustapha for the alleged murder of late
Alhaja Kudirat Abiola. He was latter discharged and acquitted by the
trial court.
The suspects were said to have informed Bamaiyi that
Oyewole’s father, was admitted at Saint Nicholas in Lagos and the $1m
was meant to assist the judge in treating his father.
Justice
Ipaye then adjourned till February 12, 2014 for the arraignment, while
she ordered that warrant of production should be served on the prison
authority to produce Ajudua at the next hearing date.
The offences
of conspiracy and obtaining by false pretences were said to be contrary
to Sections 8(a) and 1(3) of the Advance Fee Fraud Related Offences
Act. No. 13 of 1995 as ammended by Act No. 62 of 1999.
Vanguard
Dis man bi ogbologbo o, even in prison.
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