The Federal High Court in Lagos Has Ordered EFCC Freeze Three Bank Accounts Belonging to the Lagos State Government Over an Alleged N9.9bn Fraud.
The Three bank accounts are, First City Monument Bank, Access Bank, and Zenith Bank, are numbered 5617984012, 0060949275 and 1011691254.
Justice Chuka Obiozor, of Lagos State High Court has ordered for the suspension of Lagos State Bank Accounts following an ex parte application by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
EFCC, had implored the judge to freeze the accounts pending the conclusion of the investigation and possible prosecution of the Permanent Secretary in the Office of the Chief of Staff to the Governor of Lagos State, Adewale Adesanya, for money laundering.
Mr Kungmi Daniel, a member of the EFCC investigating team said the commission discovered “a huge inflow of N9,927,714,443.29” from the state accounts into an FCMB bank account opened on September 17, 2018 during the administration of former governor Akinwunmi Ambode and operated by Adesanya.
Daniel said the FCMB account showed how Adesanya and the other signatories to the account made fraudulent transferred from the accounts of the Lagos State Government.
“The trend in the account is that the account always witnessed huge inflow from Lagos State Government in the above-scheduled accounts managed by the respondent (Adesanya),”Kungmi Daniel said.
He said upon the receipt of intelligence, the EFCC analysed it and found some suspicious activities that warrants investigations.
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“There have been concerted efforts and attempts to dissipate the contents of the accounts listed in the schedule to this application.
EFCC Said, “Without freezing the nominated accounts and temporarily forfeiting the money to the Government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, there is no way the fraud being perpetrated using the scheduled accounts can be stopped,”.
Justice Chuka Obiozor granted the prayers after the submission by the EFCC lawyer, Mohammed Abba who prayed the court to grant an order to temporarily attach and take over the accounts to enable it to conclude its investigations.