The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has closed the case against ex-President Goodluck Jonathan on Media, Doyin Okupe, former Senior Special Assistant.
Mr Okupe has been charged with N702 million laundering.
This was revealed in a declaration signed on Wednesday by the spokesman of the commission, Tony Orilade.
Mr Okupe, a People’s Democratic Party (PDP) chief, was arrested on 12 December 2018 by the agency but released on administrative bail. On January 11, he was subsequently rearrested.
The committee then clarified that Mr Okupe was charged with corruption on 59-count and would be brought before a Federal High Court judge in Abuja, Ijeoma Ojukwu.
According to the declaration, prosecutor Ibrahim Audu, who is currently working with the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), submitted his last and sixth witness, Shuaibu Salisu, former Director of Administration and Finance at the Office of National Security Adviser (ONSA).
Mr Salisu told the court that “sometime in 2012, Chief Okupe came to the Office of the National Security Adviser, and after their discussion, I was directed to make a payment of N50 million to him.”
According to him, “Okupe provided his account details, where I paid the amount into the bank account of Value Trust Investment.”
He further said he was also directed by the ONSA ”to be paying N10 million monthly to Okupe for over two years”, which he said was reduced to a monthly N5 million towards the end of 2014 due to paucity of funds.
Similarly, he said he made other payments to Mr Okupe as directed, saying that at a point he was instructed to pay the defendant N6 million.
Mr Salisu further revealed that in 2014, Sambo Dasuki, the then National Security Adviser, directed that he paid the sum of N35 million to a defendant’s account.
He also recalled paying Mr Okupe another N50 million in cash on the former NSA’s instructions.
He told the court that he only obeyed directives but didn’t understand what the money was intended for.
Asked if there was proof of payments, the witness told the court that he regularly delivered payment vouchers to Mr Okupe, which he regularly signed.
Further asked if all payments were caught in payment vouchers, Mr Salisu answered in the negative.
Speaking under cross-examination by Mr Okupe’s lawyer, Akinlabi Akinbade, the witness revealed that the former press assistant was not the only person receiving payments from ONSA.
“Anybody that the NSA directs that payment be made to, we make the payment,” he said.
Under the same cross-examination, the witness said that he had no reason to think that the payments he made were from an illegal source.
“Why would I assume it was illegal? I was only directed to make payments,” he said, adding that some of the payments instructions he carried out while working in the ONSA, came verbally ”while some others came written, but in the case of the payments to Okupe, all the instructions were verbal”.
The matter was adjourned for the defense to open its case until June 26.
