The Federal Government on Tuesday slammed a 43-count charge on former National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd); former Minister of State for Finance, Bashir Yuguda; former Sokoto State Governor, Attahiru Bafarawa and his son, Sagir.
Others charged with them by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) are: High Chief Raymond Dokpesi, founder and former chairman of Daar Communications Plc and Daar Investment and Holdings Ltd; former Finance Director in the office of the NSA, Shuaibu Salisu and Aminu Baba Kusa.
Other suspects charged by the anti-graft agency are private companies said to have received huge sums from the ONSA without any clear and specified reasons.
They are: Acacia Holdings Ltd, Reliance Referral Hospital Ltd and Dalhatu Investments Ltd.
A breakdown of the charges, showed that the former NSA, Dasuki, Shauibu Salisu, Aminu Baba Kusa, Acacia Holdings and Reliance Referral Hospital were slammed with a total of 19 charges for money laundering, diversion of public funds and breach of public trust, among others.
Similarly, Bashir Yuguda, Sambo Dasuki, Shuaibu Salisu, Dalhatu Investment, Sagir Attahiru and Attahiru Bafarawa were charged with 22 counts.
High Chief Dokpesi and his company, Daar Investment and Holdings Limited were slammed with two counts each.
The cases have been filed with the Federal High Court but not yet assigned to any judge, according to findings by our correspondent.
On Monday, EFCC was reported set to press charges against the suspects this week but did not specify the date.
The agency Sunday grilled the suspects and confronted them with details of the illicit transactions that made the Federal Government lose huge sums of money.
Dasuki has already challenged the government for trying to investigate and bring him to book for the offence and breach of his fundamental rights.
The case is before Justice Ademola Adeniyi..
Also, Dokpesi, in an ex-parte application he filed through his lawyer, Chief Mike Ozehkome, SAN, urged the court to grant him bail on liberal terms, pending his formal arraignment before a court of competent jurisdiction.
Instead of granting the motion, Justice Kolawole, in a chamber ruling last Friday, ordered Dokpesi’s lawyer to go and put the Federal Government on notice and adjourned the matter till December 14.
The court also directed EFCC to produce Dokpesi before it on that day.
However, few hours after the order was made, EFCC granted administrative bail to Dokpesi.
In his application dated, December 3, Dokpesi told the court that he was detained for more than 48 hours without EFCC entering any charge against him.
Ozehkome told the court that his client was on December 1 summoned via telephone to report to the EFCC headquarters in Abuja.
He said Dokpesi has since then remained in custody on the anti-graft agency, adding that he was grilled for so many hours despite the fact that he did not have fore knowledge of why he was wanted by EFCC.
-Vanguard
