A prosecution witness, Hassan Saidu, on Friday, March 15, 2019, told Justice Ijeoma Ojukwu, of a Federal High Court, Abuja, how Doyin Okupe, a former Senior Special Assistant (SSA), to former President Goodluck Jonathan, engaged in financial transactions without vouchers.
According to EFCC, Diyi Okupe is standing trial along with Value Trust Investment Ltd and Abrahams Telecoms Ltd on a 59-count charge of money laundering and criminal diversion of funds to the tune ofN702 million (Seven Hundred and Two Million Naira).
Saidu, Head, EFCC’s Extractive Industries and Fraud Section, told the court that “though there were transfers to persons and companies, we could not tally it to the expenditure that Doyin Okupe incurred in the running of the office, because vouchers which were supposed to be produced for running of a government office were never produced”.
Testifying as the third prosecution witness, he further explained that the EFCC received petition, which among other things, revealed that various sums of money running into millions of naira were transferred to Doyin Okupe, his company and one other company, Abrahams Telecoms, by the former Director of Finance and Administration in the Office of the National Security Adviser, ONSA.
According to him, the intelligence was referred to the Special Task Force.
“The Director of Finance and Administration in the Office of the NSA was quizzed in respect of the payments made to Doyin Okupe and the two companies through a voucher tagged ‘Special Services’,” he said.
Saidu further disclosed that, “sometime in June 2016, we invited the defendant to the EFCC, where he was interrogated in respect of the payment he received from ONSA on ‘Special Services’ and payments made in the name of the two other companies”.
According to him, during interrogation, Okupe submitted the name of Value Trust, which received N50 million on August 3, 2012, while the company, Abraham Telecoms, received N35 million, on October 3, 2014.