By The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) announced on social media on Wednesday that the Federal High Court in Abuja has authorized a final forfeiture order for $13 million linked to businesswoman Aisha Achimugu and her company, Oceangate Engineering Oil & Gas Ltd, to the federal government.
According to the EFCC, the commission had taken Oceangate to court over ownership of the funds, which it says are proceeds of scam and other illegal activities.
The EFCC said that during the judgment, Justice Emeka Nwite held that “The applicant has failed woefully to establish how it came about the money,” and added, “The EFCC has succeeded in convincing this court that the funds are proceeds of fraud and should be forfeited to the government.”
The commission reported that the court dismissed claims that the money was a gift to Achimugu, noting that she “never showed up in court to show cause why the funds should not be forfeited to the federal government” and that “no single person who gave the monetary gifts to Achimugu to the tune of $13 million was called to testify.”
The EFCC said Justice Nwite also emphasized that Oceangate had not proven genuine ownership of the funds, stating that “Oceangate Engineering Company did not show the business it undertook that fetched it the money and did not also show whether any payment was made to it by its customers.”
According to the EFCC, investigator Usman Aliyu told the court in an affidavit that the funds were used by Oceangate to pay for signature bonuses for oil blocks PPL302 and PPL3007. “The $13 million… were not proceeds of any lawful and legitimate business but rather represent funds reasonably suspected to be proceeds of unlawful activity,” Aliyu said.
The commission added that Aliyu alleged part of the money came from payments made by a state government to contractors who had no contractual relationship with Oceangate, stating that “The contractors… were neither investors, directors, nor shareholders in the company.”
The EFCC said that Oceangate, in its own affidavit, claimed that “all the funds were derived partly from legitimate earnings of the company and partly gifts given to the Group Chief Executive Officer, Aisha Achimugu,” but the commission asked the court to dismiss this claim.
