The defence counsel to Fred Ajudua, a Lagos socialite accused of defrauding a former Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Ishaya Bamaiyi (rtd), on Wednesday, raised probing questions on the source of the $8.4 million that Ajudua allegedly collected from Bamaiyi.
Addressing an Ikeja High Court, Ajudua’s lawyer, Mr Olalekan Ojo (SAN), disputed Bamaiyi’s claims on the source of the money.
Citing available documents, Ojo argued that the sale of some of the property in question occurred in 1994, 10 years before the fraud.
The former chief of army staff had at previous court proceedings claimed that the source of the $8.4 million was from sale of some of his property and sales from his farm produce.
He also named other sources of the money as donations from friends, colleagues, relations and well-wishers, who had pleaded with him not to identify them because some of them held positions in government.
But responding to Ojo, Bamaiyi said that his properties were sold and that the proceeds from the sale were kept by his brother until when he needed to handover some money to Ajudua while he was in prison.
“I was in service when these properties were sold and my brother, Barrister Danladi Bamaiyi, was a witness as a solicitor when the lease agreements were signed.
“When the properties were to be sold, I invited him from Sokoto where he was practising and I called Mr Yakoe Chai, the Managing Director of HFP, the construction firm and I told him my brother was going to get the payment for the sale.
“I gave my brother a note, it was my brother that collected the money from HFP on my instruction. I instructed my brother to change the money into U.S. dollars which he did until this case came up while I was in prison.
“My brother then moved from Sokoto to Abuja for legal practice when the issue of changing my counsel came up and I called my brother to send us the money which was to be given to Chief Afe Babalola (SAN) as professional fees.
“I sent my wife Inuade to Abuja and she collected $400,000 from my brother Danladi and on November 30, 2004, she brought the money to Kirikiri Maximum Prison,” Bamaiyi said.
Probing Bamaiyi further, Ojo said: “Did you sell the property in either 2003, 2004 or 2005? Were the proceeds of the sale kept in a bank account, in the ground or at the graveyard?
“Why did you not send the hand-written note where you wrote the instructions to your brother to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)? Did you not fill asset declaration forms while you were in service?
“The farm you referred to in your evidence-in-chief, is it operating through a business name or a limited liability company?”
Responding, Bamaiyi said: “The properties were all sold in 1994 and the proceeds were kept by my brother. How he kept it, I do not know, so far as he knew what he was doing.
“I gave him a hand-written note and that was sufficient, the notes were loosely written by me.
“I did not register my farm as a limited liability company. It was after my service and after I had been discharged and acquitted by the court that I registered it as Wadtare Farms but it had been in operation since 1984.
“The farm was run in my name and it has accounts in First Bank of Nigeria at Zuru in my village. The account I have in my village is the same account the farm was using for their transactions.
“I completed my asset declaration form when I was in service and I only registered my farm after service”.
Justice Josephine Oyefeso, however, adjourned the case until November 8 for continuation of trial.
According to prosecution proceedings, Ajudua was incarcerated at the Kirikiri Maximum Prisons over alleged fraud while Bamaiyi was incarcerated over alleged involvement in the attempted murder of Mr Alex Ibru, the Publisher of The Guardian Newspapers.
The prosecution alleged that Ajudua had alongside some accomplices, approached Bamaiyi in prison in 2004 and fleeced him of the amount.
Ajudua had allegedly convinced Bamaiyi that he could hire the legal services of Chief Afe Babalola (SAN) to help secure his freedom from Kirikiri Prisons with Ajudua fraudulently receiving $8.4 million as legal fee.
When the fraud came to light, the law chambers of Afe Babalola and Co. issued a disclaimer disassociating itself from the case.
