In a court testimony, Agboro Omowera, a witness from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, revealed on Monday that 10 officials from the Central Bank of Nigeria, including the ex-governor Godwin Emefiele, had put their signatures on papers approving multi-million contracts for April 1616 and Architekon Nigeria Limited.
The EFCC claimed that Emefiele approved a payment of N97.9m to a company called Architekon Nigeria Ltd, where his wife and brother-in-law are directors. The money was for office furniture for the CBN, and it was seen as a corrupt favor.
During the trial, the investigator, who was the seventh witness for the prosecution, mentioned under questioning by the defendant’s lawyer, Mathew Burkaa (SAN), that 10 individuals were involved in the process of awarding the contracts based on the documents provided.
He said, “Ten persons acted on the documents awarding these contracts.
“There are 10 minutes and one approval, so one person takes the responsibility.
“He (Emefiele) is the head of the CBN and the buck stops at his table.”
He said the company won contracts to provide more than 45 Toyota Hilux vehicles, with prices ranging from N854,700,000 to N99,900,000.
He mentioned that his team, which includes various agencies like the Department of State Services, discovered that Yaro’s husband owned other businesses, but only the one where his wife was a director received business from the CBN.
Omowera said, “In the second company, April 1616 Investment Limited, we also discovered that one of the directors of that company by name, Sahadatu Ramalan Yaro, was a director of April 1616 Investment.
“We discovered that the company was incorporated a few days after her employment with the CBN and she was posted to CBN Lagos office.
“In 2018, the company started to enjoy the patronage of the CBN in the procurement of particular vehicles, Toyota branded motors.
“During the period that the defendant was, this company was awarded about 45 different contracts
“My Lord, we were curious as investigators, how it was possible for a company that has no track record to continually win bids against Toyota-accredited bids.
“We tried to confirm whether this company was accredited by Toyota and to our surprise, it was not among the accredited bidders.”
