The First Prosecuting Witness, PW1, William Abimbola, in the matter of former Deputy Director, Highways, Federal Ministry of Works and Housing, Augustine Ojo Olowoniyan, alongside a surveyor, Sulaiman Abdulkadir Muhammed of the Department of Highways and Planning on Monday, told Justice Jude Onwuegbuzie of the Federal High Court Abuja, how funds made for the ministry`s contract was siphoned.
Abimbola, a staff and compliance officer of United Bank of Africa, UBA, while being led in evidence by prosecuting counsel, testified on exhibit PW1E which contains the statement of transactions of the first defendant, where he revealed that on March 21, 2019, there was an inflow of N200,000 with narration from Federal Government of Nigeria. . Same date there were inflows of N300,000, N2,220,000, N917,000.00, N109,450,000.00, N3,750,400 and N4,662,000.00.
“In January 2019, there was inflow from the Federal government of Nigeria which was N2,130,000 and N4,530,000.00 , on January 30, 2019, there were similar transactions of N4,705,000 and N640,000 on March 15,20219. I saw transactions like N180,000.00. N278,369.00, N282,100.00, N1,809,950.00, N504,7000.00, N525,890,00, N581,600.00, N371,460.00, N297,000.00, N40,000.00, N249,500.00, N80,000.00 and N30,000”, he said.
Continuing “On April 4, 2019, there was an inflow of N20m, on April 16, 2019, there was an inflow of N4.9m and the other two are N4m each. On April 17, 2019 there were three inflows from the Federal government of Nigeria N35,108.00, N250,758.00 and N3,920,000.00.
This was contained in a press release by the EFCC’s head, media & publicity, Dele Oyewale, on Wednesday.
The statement added that the witness (Abimbola) further revealed that on May 9, 2019 there were inflows of N630,000.00 and N2,890,000, on May 13,2019, there were two inflows of N504,000,800 and N2,308,000, on June 13, 2019 there were inflows of N116,841,000, N190,395, N222,400, N286,650, N82,000 and N840,600, among other transactions.
“The matter was also adjourned to July 16, 17, 2025 for continuation of trial”, the statement concluded.
