The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has said it will remove the former director general of the Labor Party Presidential Campaign Council, Dr. Doyin Okupe, from its watch list following his arrest by the State Department Security Service at the Airport Murtala Muhammed International in Lagos. Thursday.
An impeccable EFCC source confirmed to our correspondent that Okupe had been on the EFCC watch list for around six years since 2016.
“Dr. Okupe is one of the individuals, groups or organizations that required close monitoring, for legal reasons. In his case, he has been on our watch list since 2016.”
Confirming the report in an interview with our correspondent, while reacting to Okupe’s arrest by the DSS and his subsequent transfer to the EFFC, anti-corruption agency spokesman Wilson Uwujaren said the EFCC would take immediate steps to remove the former aide. presidential from his watch list.
Uwujaren said: “About the interception of Doyin Okupe; The DSS, today, January 12, informed the Commission of the interception of Dr. Okupe, a former presidential adviser, at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos.
“The Service acted on a watch list request issued on July 18, 2016, more than six years before his recent conviction on money laundering charges by the Abuja Federal High Court.
“The Commission was in the process of formally lifting the watch list prior to its interception, and will expedite action on it.”
the punch reports that the DSS cited his cooperation with the EFCC as the reason for Okupe’s re-arrest today.
Responding to a query from our correspondent, DSS spokesman Dr. Peter Afunanya said: “Okupe was intercepted by DSS at Terminal 1 of Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, this morning at the request of the EFCC. He has long been turned over to the Commission that requested the action. Okupe was billed to fly to London via Virgin Atlantic.”
the punch on December 19, 2022, it reported that Okupe was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for violating the Money Laundering Law.
According to the EFCC that engineered the arrest, Okupe was charged in court for receiving N702 million in illegal payments from public funds intended to purchase weapons to fight the insurgency in 2019. The Federal High Court convicted him of the offence.
One of the charges read: “That you, Dr. Doyin Okupe, being the Principal Special Assistant to President Goodluck Jonathan from July 2012 to May 2015 and being the Director General/CEO, and signatory to the Abrahams bank account Telecoms Limited, on October 3, 2014, at Abuja within the jurisdiction of this honorable court, directly took possession or control of the sum of N35 million, transferred to the account of Abrahams Telecoms Ltd from the account of the Office of the Adviser of Homeland Security with the Central Bank of Nigeria, allegedly for special services when he reasonably should have known that said fund was part of the proceeds of illegal activity.”
Judge Ojukwu, in a ruling, held that Okupe, also a former media senior special assistant (SSA) to former President Goodluck Jonathan, was found guilty of contravening sections 16(1) and (2) of the Money Laundering Act. , for accepting cash payments without going through a financial institution, in excess of the threshold allowed by the Law.
