El-Rufai alloted plots of land to family, coys – Witness

Posted by admin General Politics, Latest Politics Wednesday, March 21st, 2012

His two wives, Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello, others beneficiaries

BY IKECHUKWU NNOCHIRI

ABUJA – An Abuja High Court in Maitama, yesterday, heard how former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Mallam Nasir El- Rufai, connived with two senior officials of the Geographical Information Systems, AGIS, and illegally allocated several plots of land to his private companies and family members.

An operative of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mr. Sunday Idowu, who testified as a prosecution witness yesterday, said the two government officials involved in the land scam were the former Director General of AGIS, Mrs Altine Jubril ,and the former General Manager of the establishment, Ismaila Iro, who are both facing trial alongside the erstwhile minister.

The accused persons are answering to an 8-count criminal charge bothering on conspiracy, fraud and gross abuse of public office.

At the resumed hearing on the case yesterday, the witness, who was led in evidence by the prosecuting counsel, Mr Adebayo Adelodun, SAN, gave detailed steps that were taken by his investigative team towards ascertaining culpability of the three accused persons.

He said the team identified an official memo written by a senior official of FCDA, advising against irregular conversion of the plots, an advice he said was disregarded by the ex-minister.

According to Idowu who is a Police Inspector, “we interacted with interested parties notably Abuja Geographical Information Services, AGIS, Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, Nigeria Postal Service, NIPOST, Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, Federal Capital Development Authority, FCDA, among others who gave us insight into what actually happened.”

“At AGIS, investigation revealed that plots 1201 and 3352 which were originally allocated to PHCN and NIPOST were revoked and then re-allocated to nine private individuals, including two wives of the former minister, daughter of former President Obasanjo, Iyabo Obasanjo–Bello, a serving senator, Philip Aduda and the 2nd and 3rd accused persons”, the witness said.

He said a letter that was written to the investigative team by the CAC, disclosed that El-Rufai and Ismaila Iro, the 1st and 3rd accused persons respectively, are directors in some or all of the three companies which benefited from the re-allocation, namely: System Property Development Company, SPDC, Express Procurement Ltd and Pure Environment Services.

“In the course of investigation, it was discovered that one of the irregularly converted plots, allocated to one of the wives of the 1st accused person with new plot number 337 was also used by him as one of the properties declared as his own in his Asset Declaration Form with the Code of Conduct Bureau, CCB.

Kanu Agabi, SAN, counsel to the 3rd accused person, Ismail Iro, while cross examining the witness, asked him if he did not know that NIPOST had initiated a civil case on the same matter before initiating a trial against the accused persons. Idowu responded that he was not aware of the civil case but was more concerned as an investigator to carry on with the criminal aspect of the case, which was brought before the Commission.

Meanwhile, earlier in his testimony, a former Executive Secretary with the FCDA, Engr. Sani Alhassan, disclosed that after a meeting with PHCN where it was discovered that the earlier revocation was no more necessary, a memo was written to the minister advising him to revert to status quo.

The case has been adjourned to April 25 for continuation of cross-examination of the witness.

El-Rufai, who was arraigned by EFCC on April 7, was immediately released on self-recognition by the court, even though his two co-accused persons were mandated to deposit N50 million each to the court registrar as bond.

Following the refusal of the high court to quash the charge against him, the 1st accused, El-Rufai had urged the court to allow him to invite the current FCT Minister, Senator Mohammed Bala, to appear before the court with documents that will exonerate him from prosecution, a request that was granted by trial Justice Abubakar Sadiq Umar.

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