Faisal, the 21-year-old son of former chairman, Pension Reform Task Team (PRTT), Abdulrasheed Maina, has been jailed in absentia for 14 years.
The Federal High Court sitting in Abuja found him guilty of helping his father launder N58 million. His father is facing a separate trial for allegedly stealing at least N2 billion from pension funds.
The trial judge, Okon Abang, found Faisal, who once jumped bail like his father until the Interpol arrested him in the Niger Republic, guilty on all the three counts of money laundering charges pressed against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
The judge read the sentencing in the absence of Faisal who had jumped bail since June 2020 during the trial.
The judge jailed him for 14 years on counts 2 and for five years on each of counts 1 and 3. The sentences are to run concurrently, meaning he would spend at least 12 calendar years in jail because eight months in prison makes one year.
The judge said the EFCC proved beyond reasonable doubt that Faisal operated a fictitious bank account with the United Bank for Africa (UBA), through which his father, Maina, laundered the sum of N58.1million.
The court noted that the funds deposited into the account that was operated in the name of Alhaji Faisal Farm 2 were sequentially withdrawn by the convict and his father, between October 2013 and June 2019.
“The defendant reasonably ought to have known that inflows into the bank account formed proceeds of an unlawful act of corruption by his father (Mr Maina),” the judge said.
The judge also ordered that the convicted fugitive should be arrested anywhere he is found in Nigeria and remanded in any correctional service center to serve his jail term.
The court further held that in the event the convict was traced to anywhere outside the shores of Nigeria, the federal government, “shall legally or lawfully commence extradition process to bring him into the country to serve the jail term.”
The court ordered that the company through which the fund was laundered, Alhaji Faisal Farm 2, be wound up, with funds in it forfeited to the government.
