The Unbiased Corrupt Practices and Different Associated Offences Fee (ICPC) have charged former Governor Nasir El Rufai’s ex-chief of Employees, Muhammad Bashir Saidu, to the Federal Excessive Court docket in Kaduna for allegedly looting the federal government treasury.Saidu, who was additionally a one-time Commissioner of Finance in Kaduna State underneath the El Rufai administration, was charged together with one Ibrahim Muktar, ‘’a public officer within the employment of the Ministry of Finance,’’ on Tuesday.
In keeping with cost No. FHC/KD/IC/2025, the defendants are being accused of two counts of Cash Laundering, opposite to an earlier declare that Alhaji Muhammad Bashir Saidu had been exonerated of all expenses after 10 months of investigation.
The court docket doc acknowledged that someday in March 2022 or thereabouts, Alhaji Muhammad Bashir Saidu, who at the moment was Commissioner of Finance, ‘’did settle for a money fee of the sum of N155,000,000 from one Ibrahim Muktar, exceeding the quantity authorised by legislation, which sum you acquired in money by proxy to wit: Muazu Abdu, your Particular Assistant, and also you thereby dedicated an offence opposite to Part 2(a) and punishable underneath Part 19(d) of the Cash Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022.’’
The ICPC additionally alleged that in the identical March 2022 or thereabouts, Bashir Saidu “not directly took management of the sum of N155,000,000.00 acquired in money for and on behalf of you by one Muazu Abdul from Ibrahim Muktar, which fund you fairly should have recognized fashioned a part of the proceeds of an illegal exercise to wit: corruption and also you hereby dedicated an offence opposite to Part 18(2)(d) and punishable underneath Part 18(3) of the Cash Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022.’’
Part 18(3) of the Cash Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022 states that “any one that contravenes the provisions of subsection (2) is liable on conviction to imprisonment for a time period of not lower than 4 years however no more than fourteen years, or a high-quality not lower than 5 instances the worth of the proceeds of the crime or each.’’
The cost sheet, which was signed by the Assistant Chief Authorized Officer of ICPC, Dr Osuobeni Ekoi Akponimisingha, was filed on Tuesday, January 7, 2025, on the Federal Excessive Court docket of Nigeria, Holden in Kaduna.
