Presidency denies friction over appointment
Presidential spokesman, Dr. Reuben Abati
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The Presidency on Tuesday denied speculations of a friction within the information management team of President Goodluck Jonathan with the recent appointment of Dr. Doyin Okupe as the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Affairs.
The President’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, made the clarification while formally introducing Okupe to State House correspondents at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
He said the information team, with the coming on board of Okupe with a lot of experience, would be engaging the public with coherence.
He said, “In the last few days, there has been a lot of speculations out there in the media; all kinds of theory, all kinds of assumptions on whether there is friction in the villa, whether there is confusion in terms of the President’s information management process.
“This morning, I have called this meeting to specially introduce to you Dr. Doyin Okupe who has been appointed by Mr. President as the Senior Special Assistant in charge of Public Affairs.
“There is no conflict in our information management process. Dr. Okupe is joining our team with a lot of experience. He is a man that you all know very well. He is gifted with a lot of political savvy, very amiable, very highly-respected within the society.
“He comes to this team with a lot of confidence in the Jonathan project. One thing we both have in common is that we both have a passion for the Jonathan’s transformation agenda and we believe in President Jonathan that he deserves the support of all Nigerians and that as many people as possible should join hands together to promote that transformation agenda.
“There is no conflict at all, we are working together as a team and you are not going to see any kind of friction. If anything, you are going to see us engaging the public with a lot of coherence.”
Responding, Okupe reiterated Abati’s explanation that the position of Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Affairs is not in any way in conflict with the job of the Special Adviser to the President.
He said Abati remained the presidential spokesman.
He said, “The Special Adviser to the President remains the presidential spokesman. All official policies and statements emanating from the President are released through him.
Okupe explained that while the President and Abati would be outside the country, it would be his responsibility to engage the public on currents issues of national importance.
He denied reports that he was hired as an attack dog by the President.
He said, “We are to interface between the Presidency and the public. That is the job. What you will see is a synergy, not a conflict.
“Somebody said Okupe has been hired as an attack dog. If President Jonathan hires a 60-year-old man as attack dog, then he is employing a weak attack dog. I am not an attack dog. My job basically is public advocacy.”
UK court orders Akingbola to refund N164b to Access Bank
Akingbola
Former Managing Director of the defunct Intercontinental Bank Plc Erastus Akingbola has been ordered to refund N164billion to Access Bank Plc by the High Court of Justice, Queens Bench Division in London.
In a ruling delivered in London yesterday, Justice Burton ordered Akingbola to refund the N164billion being proceeds of unlawful share purchase scheme and fund misappropriation which was converted into personal use during his tenure as Managing Director.
Akingbola was sacked by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) with eight other bank heads in 2008 for running their institutions aground.
Access Bank acquired Intercontinental Bank last year.
The court, according to details of the judgment made available to The Nation, held that Akingbola devised and oversaw the implementation of the strategy to buy the bank’s shares.
The court found under cross examination that Akingbola lied that he did not know that the bank was buying its own shares.
It was discovered that shortly before the implementation of the strategy to increase the bank’s share price, Akingbola had borrowed N9.3billion to purchase a large quantity of the bank’s shares.
The court held that the illegal share purchase scheme substantially contributed to the collapse of Intercontinental Bank Plc.
Moreover, further investigation by the court showed that at a time Intercontinental Bank was undergoing significant liquidity strain, its MD misappropriated N16 billion, which was paid to Tropics Companies, a business owned by his family to repay debts owed by the companies personally guaranteed by Akingbola.
He was also found to have misappropriated another £8.5million, which was paid to his English solicitors to complete the purchase of luxury property in London in his name.
This judgment may have justified the intervention of the CBN after its findings on some of the illegalities unravelled following its special audit, which led to the removal of the banks’CEOs.
Akingbola’s trial was early last month stalled as the lead defence counsel, Felix Fagboungbe (SAN) and Deji Sasegbon (SAN) were absent.
He is also on trial for alleged N47.1 billion theft before Justice Habeeb Abiru of the Lagos High Court, Ikeja in a suit filed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
PDP Asks Lagos State Speaker to Resign Over N500 Million Fraud Allegation
In what appears to be a reaction to the Action Congress of Nigeria’s (ACN’s) call for the resignation of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP’s), national chairman, Bamanga Tukur, thePDP yesterday called for the resignation of the speaker, Lagos State House of Assembly, Adeyemi Ikuforiji over alleged N500 million scam.
According to the PDP, it was disheartening and unfortunate that no chieftain of the ACN has been prosecuted in its controlled states despite what thePDP described as ‘’the barrage of cases of misconduct in these states.”
In a statement by the PDP, signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, the party professed its continued support for its National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, stressing that the party was not prepared to sacrifice his son, Mahmud Tukur over his prosecution by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC on the subsidy payment scandal.
According to the PDP, “The ACN has also turmed the other way in the case of a N500 million fraud allegation against the Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly. There has been no call for the speaker to resign. Till date, there is no record of any ACN official or chieftain standing trial in any ACN controlled State despite the barrage of cases of misconduct in these states”.
Subsidy “Thieves” Are Government Sponsors –Pastor Bakare
The popularly known overseer of the Latter Rain Assembly, Pastor Tunde Bakare, has said that his messageagainst perverse and corrupt leaders has not changed and that he would not tone down his message despite his being grilled by the State Security Service, SSS, on the matter.
“Whenever you ask the prophet to tone down his message, his God will respond on his behalf. The answer to tone down is tone up.
“In the days of President Olusegun Obasanjo, the message that shook the nation was titled “No more walls” preached on March 7, 1999. Today the message is stronger and bolder,” he said
The convener of the Save Nigerian Group, SNG, said those who are in the helm of affairs of the nation are set of deceitful and insincere leaders who lacked the wisdom and political will to do what is right.
“My message has not changed since the days of the military. A corrupt, perverse, wasteful, directionless and clueless government is offensive to me and should be offensive to every intelligent patriot in this nation.
“The messages I preach are only biased in favour of righteousness, justice and truth. To this, I plead guilty because there is nothing anyone can do against truth, but for the truth.
“If I am being asked to tone down my message because of perceived partisanship, those asking me to do so have only succeeded in precipitating a tone up and examples abound in scriptures which I encourage our security service agents and men of the armed forces and the police to read and meditate on in the pursuit of their lawful duties,” he added.
Bakare also said that the recent arraignment of those involved in the oil subsidy scandal was a mere charade, stressing that the brains behind the scam were those who sponsored the election of President GoodluckJonathan and top members of his cabinet.
The cleric, who spoke on Sunday while delivering the second part of his sermon in his church tagged, “How to change government peacefully and make society better”, said that what is going on in the arraignment of the subsidy “thieves” was a mere window dressing.
“The shenanigans and the charade going on in respect of the subsidy thieves, in my considered opinion are that the efforts of this government cannot deliver justice, neither are they meant to.”
Bakare also berated the wife of the President for her activities. “Can you imagine that as the nation is burning, Dame Patience Jonathan, the First Lady, is busy pursuing and obtaining the status of an absentee Permanent Secretary? Does this make any intelligent sense except to political morons and imbeciles?”
The cleric warned the security agencies to re-channel their energies towards doing their primary assignment of maintaining peace and providing security for Nigerians instead of arresting people for saying the truth, adding that “Otherwise they are going to see the wrath of God”.
Photo: Sportman with Man hood showing in the sportwear
It is a serious matter when at rest a sport man's private still has to show this much. Imagine what those being entertained will really be looking at when events are going on. Olympics will definitely be fun for the ladies if a lot of men like this appear on the pitch.
UNILAG Honours Pastor E.A. Adeboye, Others
The General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Enoch Adeboye and 46 other alumni of the university were on Friday conferred with the “Distinguished Alumni Award” of UNILAG.
Other recipients of the award include the following:
Inspector-General of Police, Mr. M.D Mohammed, Ekiti State Governor, Dr. Kayode Fayemi; Senate Majority leader, Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba (SAN); former Lagos State Deputy Governor, Mrs. Sarah Sosan; the Vice-Presidential Candidate of the Congress for Progressive Change in the 2011 presidential election, Pastor Tunde Bakare; wife of the governor of Ogun State, Mrs. Olufunso Amosun; Minister of the Interior, Mr. Abba Moro; Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Emeka Ihedioha; Nigeria’s High Commissioner to the UK, Alhaji Dalhatu Tafida; Minister of Sports, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi; and Minority Leader in the House of Reps, Mr. Femi Bajabiamila.
EFCC withdraws subsidy fraud charges against four
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has withdrawn charges of alleged fraud in the fuel subsidy payments against Durosola Omogbenigun and Peter Mba along with their firms.
Counsel for the EFCC, Mr. Oyedepo Rotimi, told a Lagos High Court in Igbosere on Tuesday that the charge tagged, ID/122C/2012, was mistakenly instituted against Omogbenigun, his company Integrated Resources Limited, like Mba and his Pinnacle Oil and Gas firm.
According to the lawyer, the charge had not been served on the defence as Tuesday’s proceedings.
Justice Samuel Candide-Johnson struck out the charge following an application by the EFCC.
The EFCC, in the charge, alleged that they conspired on different occasions to fraudulently collect over N2bn from the Federal Government under the Petroleum Support Fund, purporting the money to be payments for importing certain litres of petrol).
The four were charged with four counts of conspiracy to obtain and obtaining property by false pretences.
The anti-graft body said the offences were contrary to Section 8 and 1 (3) of the Advance Fee Fraud and other Fraud Related Offences Act 2006.
However, Rotimi said he was instructed by the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke, to withdraw the case.
He said the EFCC found out after a review that the suspects did not commit the offence for which they were to be arraigned.
Rotimi said, “We have information (charge) dated July, 20 2012 before this court. I have the instruction of the Attorney-General to withdraw the information.
“The information has not been served on the defence. I urge the court to strike out the charge.”
He added, “The charges preferred against the defendants in this case were misconstrued by the prosecution and were inadvertently filed against the said defendants.
“A review of the prosecution’s case and the evidence available to the prosecution clearly showed that the defendants did not commit the offences for which they are charged.
“The complainant/applicant in consideration of the above fact has decided to withdraw the criminal charge before this Honourable Court against the defendant and substitute it with an information already filed at the registry of this Honourable Court in suit No. ID/122C/2012 – Federal Republic of Nigeria vs. Oluwaseun Ogunbambo and others.
“Withdrawing the charge against the defendants will meet the interest of justice in the case.”
The judge said, “At the instance of the prosecution, the information, having been withdrawn, is struck out.”
In its application dated July 26, the EFCC premised on Section 73 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Law of Lagos State 2007, Rotimi sought an order granting the EFCC leave to withdraw the charge “against all the defendants.”
Meanwhile, spokesman for the EFCC, Wilson Uwujaren said, “The withdrawal of the charges against Pinnacle Oil and Gas Plc and others was deliberate. In the face of fresh evidence, the commission felt the need to firm up the charges, fully convinced that it is better to consolidate the charges ahead of formal arraignment than to start making amendments thereafter.”
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