A Federal High Court in Abuja has discharged and acquitted a former Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Andrew Yakubu, of laundering about $9.8 million.
Justice Ahmed Mohammed, in a judgment yesterday, held that the prosecuting agency, the Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubts, as required by law.
Justice Mohammed also held that the EFCC failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt the necessary ingredients of the alleged offences in counts three and four, for which the Court of Appeal ordered the defendant to enter a defence.
He said: “The evidence of the defendant (Yakubu) was not only credible but reliable. The prosecution failed to contradict the evidence, as required by law.”
The judge upheld the defendant’s defence that the foreign currencies found in his Kaduna home were gifts and donations from friends and well-wishers after he retired as NNPC GMD.
He also agreed with the defendant’s contention that the money was not collected in bulk but in tranches, adding that part of the amount was from Yakubu’s savings from the various official foreign trips he embarked upon while in office.
The judge said the EFCC ought to have investigated the defendant’s claims that the monetary gifts he claimed to have received came from his friends.
He added that, unfortunately and for reasons best known to the commission, it did not investigate the defendant’s claim.
“To worsen the situation, the prosecution assumed that the money was accepted in one fell swoop as against the evidence of the defendant that he got the money in piecemeal as gifts from his friends when he retired from service in 2014.
“It is a huge error that the prosecution did not tender the money as Exhibit throughout the trial, but made futile efforts after it had closed its case.
“In all, Mr. Yakubu’s evidence cast a huge doubt on that of the EFCC and the doubt must be resolved in his favour,” Justice Mohammed said.
The EFCC had, in 2017, raided Yakubu’s Kaduna home, where it claimed to have found $9,772,800 and £74,000 in a safe.
