By Steve Anya
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has recovered over N20 billion of the over N70 billion that was lost to fraudsters, from all the petroleum subsidy matters so far.
The EFCC Chairman, Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa, said this on Wednesday after he appeared before a Lagos State High Court, Ikeja, to give evidence in a N1.4 billion fraud trial involving an oil company, Nadabo Energy Ltd.
The Chairman who spoke to journalists after the court sitting, further said that the Commission is committed to bringing all subsidy matters presently ongoing to an end, and stated that none of the petroleum subsidy cases have been stopped.
Mr Bawa further stated that, those who have jumped bail will be brought back to face the full wrath of the law. According to him, the Commission is presently working on it.
While in court, the EFCC Chairman was led in evidence by the prosecution counsel, Seidu Atteh. Mr Bawa said he analysed the email correspondences of the Defendants and found out that contrary to their claim, they took about six million litres of petrol from a mother vessel (MT Evriduk) to their chartered vessel (MT St.Vanessa). “The email further confirmed that, the same quantity was discharged at Port Harcourt. In addition, the email also informed us that one Mr Jide Akpan was the agent of the vessel”, Mr Bawa said, in this case which he, as an EFCC investigator, was a prosecution witness before his appointment as the Chairman of the anti-graft agency.
“We invited the said Akpan, and during the course of our interrogation with him, he confirmed that the first Defendant through the second Defendant, deferred the vessel and paid for it.”
In his previous testimony, Mr Bawa told the court that based on investigation carried out on the Defendants’ dealings with Staco Insurance Company, “the Certificate of marine insurance used by the Defendant for the transaction in question, was forged”.
The EFCC had accused Abubakar Ali Peters and his company, Nadabo Energy, of allegedly using forged documents to obtain N1.4 billion from the Federal Government as oil subsidy, after allegedly inflating the quantity of premium motor spirit, PMS, purportedly supplied to 14,000M.
The Defendants had pleaded not guilty to the charges.
