Contractor admits receiving N2.17b from office of NSA for no Project – EFCC

Contractor Olugbenga Obadina, prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for receiving payments from the Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) without a contractual agreement, admitted in court on May 20, 2024, that the payments to his company, Almond Projects Limited, were not for any power project in Yobe State.

The EFCC is prosecuting Obadina and his company on an eight-count charge, including conspiracy, official corruption, and money laundering, for allegedly receiving N2.17 billion from the NSA under Colonel Sambo Dasuki (Rtd) on November 28, 2015, without providing any services or being scheduled to do so.

’Under cross-examination based on Obadina’s evidence-in-chief, prosecution counsel, Ibrahim Buba asked the defendant to identify the project for which payments were made to his company. Specifically, he was also asked to state if the payment was for the purpose of installing a power plant or any power project in Yobe State, to which he answered in the negative.

”My lord, with reference to payments in the document that is written, particularly to the Almond project, no site was mentioned in all of the descriptions. No location was mentioned in any of the descriptions my lord,” the EFCC statement quotes him as saying

The statement further adds that when prodded further by prosecution counsel to confirm if it would be right to say that no part of the payments was made for the installation of solar or power plants in Yobe State, the defendant acquiesced, stating, “Yes, none of these payments was made for the installation of solar in the state.”

‘’Citing the defendant’s extra-judicial statement, marked Exhibit GO1, 1-9, prosecution counsel pointed out that there was nowhere in the entirety of the defendant’s statement where he specifically mentioned a particular area in Yobe State where the project was to be executed and though the defendant contested the claim, saying that he mentioned a site outside Damataru, the state capital, but could not point to it in his statement when challenged by the prosecution counsel to do so.