Tuesday, December 03, 2024 - Justice Jude Onwuegbuzie, on Monday, December 2, 2024 gave a ruling on a final forfeiture of an estate in Abuja measuring 150,500 square metres and containing 753 Units of duplexes and other apartments.
This is the single largest asset recovery by the Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission, EFCC, since its inception in 2003. The Estate rests on Plot
109 Cadastral Zone C09, Lokogoma District, Abuja.
The forfeiture of the property to the federal government by a former top
brass of the government was pursuant to EFCC’s mandate and policy directive of
ensuring that the corrupt and fraudulent do not enjoy the proceeds of their
unlawful activities. In this instance, the Commission relied on Section 17 of
the Advance Fee Fraud And Other Fraud Related Offences Act No 14, 2006 and
Section 44 (2) B of the Constitution of the 199 Constitution of the Federal
Republic of Nigeria to push its case.
Ruling on the Commission’s application for the final forfeiture of the
property, Justice Onwuegbuzie held that the respondent had not shown cause as
to why he should not lose the property, “which has been reasonably suspected to
have been acquired with proceeds of unlawful activities, the property is hereby
finally forfeited to the federal government.”
The road to the final forfeiture of the property was paved by an interim
forfeiture order, secured before the same Judge on November 1, 2024. The
government official which fraudulently built the estate is being investigated
by the EFCC. The forfeiture of the asset is an important modality of depriving
the suspect of the proceeds of the crime.
The justification for the forfeiture is derived from Part 2, Section 7
of the EFCC Establishment Act, which stipulates that the EFCC “has power to
cause investigations to be conducted as to whether any person, corporate body
or organization has committed any offence under this Act or other law relating
to economic and financial crimes and cause investigations to be conducted into
the properties of any person if it appears to the Commission that the person’s
lifestyle and extent of the properties are not justified by his source of
income.”
The Commission’s Executive Chairman, Mr. Ola Olukoyede, has repeatedly
described asset recovery as pivotal in the fight against corruption, economic
and financial crimes and a major disincentive against the corrupt and the
fraudulent.
Addressing members of the House of Representatives Committee on
Anti-corruption recently, he said, “If you understand the intricacies involved
in financial crimes investigation and prosecution you will discover that to
recover one billion naira is war. So, I told my people that the moment we start
an investigation we must also start asset tracing because asset recovery is
pivotal in the anti-corruption fight; and one of the potent instruments that
you can deploy as an anti-corruption agency for an effective fight is asset
tracing and recovery. If you allow the corrupt or those that you are
investigating to have access to the proceeds of their crime, they will fight
you with it. So one of the ways to weaken them is to deprive them of the
proceeds of their crime. So, our modus operandi has changed simultaneously. The
moment we begin investigation, we begin asset tracing. That was what helped us
to make our recoveries.”
The Establishment Act of the Commission places huge emphasis on asset
recovery. Subject to the provisions of Section 24 of the Act, “whenever the
assets and properties of any person arrested under the Act are attached, the
Commission shall apply to the court for an interim forfeiture and where a
person is arrested for an offence under the Act, the Commission shall
immediately trace and attach all the assets and properties of the person
acquired as a result of such economic and financial crime and shall thereafter
cause to be obtained an interim attachment order from the Court. And where the
assets or properties of any person arrested for an offence under the Act has
been seized or any assets or property has been seized by the Commission under
the Act, the Commission shall cause an application to be made to the Court for
an interim order forfeiting the property concerned to the Federal Government
and the court shall, if satisfied that there is prima facie evidence that the
property concerned is liable to forfeiture, make an interim order forfeiting
the property to the Federal Government, which the Commission would usually
escalate to earn a final forfeiture”.
This procedure was duly followed in this respect. The recovery of the
asset represents a milestone in the annals of operations of the EFCC and
infallible proof of the commitment of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to the
anti-corruption war.
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