Willie Obiano allegedly used three unlicensed companies to siphon funds during his time as governor of Anambra State, a witness told a Federal High Court in Abuja on Monday.
Mr Obiano is facing nine charges of diversion of over N4 billion (N4,006,573,350) from the state’s account dedicated to security funds in his last five years in office.
He served as governor of the South-eastern state from 2014 to 2022 under the platform of the All Progressives Grand Alliance.
The former governor is being prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
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Mr Obiano, now a defendant, allegedly directed the diversion of the money from the state’s account between April 2017 and March 2022.
EFCC alleged that the funds were diverted through companies “that had no business relationship with the Anambra State Government”.
The anti-graft agency claimed the funds were then converted to dollars and handed over to the then-governor in cash.
The former governor allegedly stole the money over five years by instructing his Chief Protocol Officer/Deputy Chief of Staff, Uzuegbuna Okagbue, to transfer various sums of money from the state on various occasions.
But Mr Obiano denied all nine charges during his arraignment in January 2024.
Witness speaks
During Monday’s proceedings, the EFCC presented their third witness, Andrew Ali, a staffer of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and head of the licence office, according to a statement by the anti-graft agency posted on Facebook.
Mr Ali told the court during the hearing that three companies out of the 23 company accounts connected with the alleged N4 billion fraud were not duly licensed with the CBN to carry out Bureau De Change (BDC) business.
The witness, while being led in evidence by prosecution counsel, Slyvanus Tahir, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), identified the three companies as Connaught International service, SY Panda Enterprise and Zirga Zirga Trading company.
He said Zirga had been delisted from the CBN licence list before 2014, when Mr Obiano took over office as governor.
“Sometimes around April 2023, we received two letters from the EFCC regarding some 23 financial institutions to know if they were licenced or not, I recall forwarding the two letters to the desk officer, who upon review, said we have received such letters in the past before so we comprehensively replied the EFCC in a letter dated May 21, 2023 and as seen in the letter of our response, out of 23 companies, three of them were not registered,” he said.
The eight-page letter from the EFCC and the response were admitted in evidence and marked as exhibit A1-A8, according to the statement.
‘No licencing requirements’
Mr Ali, during a cross examination by the defence counsel, Onyechi Ikpeazu, also a SAN, recalled that Zirga Zirga trading company did not meet the licencing requirements before 2014.
“Once you do not meet the requirements, you are delisted.
“It is in public knowledge that we only supervise the people that are licensed, once you are not on our list, we lose the power to supervise you,” he said.
“We run a public notice to sensitise the public not to operate with unlicensed companies which is also on our website.”
Continuing, the witness stressed that the delisting of companies that do not meet requirements for renewable licensing was backed up by Section 15 and 19 of the CBN Revised Operational Guidelines 2015.
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“Our work is to regulate, and supervise them. Once you do not meet the requirement of renewable licensing, you will be delisted and we publish it on our valedictory list which is on our website.
“BDCs also have operational accounts which they do business with, they are not allowed to do business without those accounts,” he stated.
The judge, Inyang Ekwo, adjourned the matter to 26 February 2025 for continuation of trial.
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