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| Erastus Akingbola,,former MD of Intercontinental Bank. |
An Ikeja High Court was, Wednesday, told how the former Managing Director of Intercontinental Bank Plc, Dr Erastus Akingbola, illegally transferred about N2 billion (£8.5 million) from the bank to his domiciliary account abroad.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, yesterday, called its first witness. Akingbola is on trial over N47.5 billion fraud and stealing alongside one of his aides, Mr. Bayo Dada.
Led in evidence by the EFCC counsel, Mr. Emmanuel Ukala, SAN, the witness, Mr. Abdulraheem Jimoh, a chief inspector with Intercontinental Bank, said the transactions took place in March 2009, when Akingbola was the MD of the bank.On how the transfer was carried out, Jimoh told the court that Akingbola allegedly transferred money from the account of the bank and converted same to his personal use at five different times. He listed the alleged illegal transfers to include £8.5 million, £1.3 million, N10bn, N2.5 bn and N8.6 bn.
The witness said, “in the course of my work, I conducted investigations on five transactions linked to the first defendant, (Akingbola). The first transaction involved the transfer of £ 8m pounds, that is (£8, 540,134.58) outside Nigeria shortly after the intervention of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, into the bank’s operations.”
He told the court that the discoveries was made possible through the information received from the Intercontinental Bank’s correspondent’s banks, Dutsche, which sent a letter to the bank in Nigeria on September 3, 2009 on money laundering and asked Intercontinental bank to confirm if the transaction met the legal requirements.
According to him, from their investigations, they deduced that the transactions by the former CEO did not meet the laid down procedure. He said that as at the time, the transaction was made on March 13, 2009, Akingbola had no credit facilities to guarantee him such transactions.
The witness who claimed he had been in banking for upward of 22 years, noted that Akingbola carried out illegal businesses by moving the various sums from the bank to the account of one of the bank’s subsidiaries, Intercontinental Capital Market Limited, with other illegal transactions made by him, which he also explained involved the ex-chairman of the bank, Dr. Raymond Obieri.
He said, “from this account, the money was moved to a customer’s account, Megal Investment Limited belonging to the Chairman of intercontinental Bank Plc, Dr. Raymond Obieri. From the account of Megal Investment, the money was moved to the accounts of seven operators of Bureau de Change (BDCs) in the state.”
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