A former Executive Director with First Bank of Nigeria Plc, Dauda Lawal, currently standing trial for allegedly receiving money traced to the purported loot of Diezani Alison-Madueke, a former minister, has testified before the presidential panel investigating Ibrahim Magu, the suspended acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Lawal testified before the Justice Ayo Salami-led panel against Magu on Saturday, according to the Punch.
The former banker is facing trial for allegedly receiving $25m out of the $153m loot traced to Diezani, a former minister of Petroleum Resources.
It was learnt that ex-banker was invited to appear before the panel as part of a probe into the investigative deficiencies of the EFCC under Magu.
A source close to the panel said Lawal was asked to testify without prejudice to his ongoing corruption trial, the newspaper reports.
Magu, it was gathered, walked into the venue where the panel sits at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa around 12pm, three hours before he was scheduled to appear.
“Lawal appeared before the panel to clarify some allegations he had made in the past against the EFCC some of which had been reported to the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation. This was without prejudice to his ongoing corruption trial,” the source said.
“However, Magu strolled in around 12pm even though he was expected to arrive at 3pm. The panel members were initially reluctant to let Magu witness the hearing but he pleaded and was permitted to do so.”
But Lawal, it was learnt, repeated the allegations he made against the EFCC in a counter-affidavit he filed before Justice Muslim Hassan of a Federal High Court in 2017.
In a counter-affidavit he deposed before the court following the freezing of his accounts and the application for the permanent forfeiture of his funds by the EFCC, Lawal said the anti-graft agency detained him for 11 days in 2016 and promised to release him only on the condition that he return some funds.
He narrated that he received the said $25 million after he received a call from a friend, Stanley Lawson, in March 2015, who requested that he (Lawal) should help collect the money.
Lawal stated that he subsequently paid into an account provided for him.
The former banker said the EFCC allegedly compelled him to provide funds he never received.
However, the embattled EFCC czar has rejected the allegations levelled against him.
In a statement issued by Wahab Shittu, his lawyer, on Sunday, Magu said he will no longer overlook the allegations made against him.
The statement was in reaction to media reports that Magu was facing fresh investigation for failing to declare his assets before the Code of Conduct Bureau as required by law.
The statement partly read: “Take notice that our client can no longer fold his hands in the face of these sustained malicious attacks to prejudge him in the public space. Our client will henceforth, point by point reply to all false allegations orchestrated against him in the public space on a daily basis as well as present his comprehensive defence for the world to see.”
Another lawyer to Magu, Tosin Ojaomo, described the appearance of Lawal, currently under trial, before the panel to provide testimony against his client as shocking and inappropriate.
“It is absurd that Dauda Lawal who is standing trial and has returned money believed to be proceeds of crime is being used as a witness. This is against the principle of natural justice. This is what we have been complaining about,” Ojaomo told the newspaper.
