Why EFCC failed to arraign ex-NIA DG, Oke, wife

                    

Oke

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on Friday failed to arraign the sacked Director General of the National Intelligence Agency, Ambassador Ayodele Oke, and his wife, Folashade because both of them may have left the country.

The anti-graft agency had on Wednesday filed four charges against the Okes before the Federal High Court in Lagos.

They were scheduled to be arraigned on Friday before Justice C.J. Aneke in connection with the sums of $43,449,947, £27,800 and N23,218,000 (totalling N13bn) removed by the EFCC from Flat 7B Osborne Towers, Ikoyi, Lagos linked to them.
On Friday, however, the EFCC failed to produce them in court.

Punch reports that the EFCC prosecutor, Rotimi Oyedepo, who came to court without the defendants, asked the court registrars to reschedule the arraignment till Wednesday, February 6.
There had been online reports suggesting that Oke and his wife may have left the country.
When contacted on phone, the spokesman for the EFCC, Tony Orilade, said he was on his way to the office and would get back to our correspondent on the situation of things.

Orilade, however, noted that as of Wednesday, the EFCC had still not been able to get the Okes.
The charges against the Okes and the sacked Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal, filed in Abuja last week, were believed to have come as a response from the President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration to allegations of selectivity in its anti-graft war.

Though a presidential probe panel headed by Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, had since 2017 indicted Lawal and the Okes in its report, the Federal Government failed to act on the report, until last week when defendants were charged to court.