Azibaola, Jonathan’s Cousin, Diverted $40m Tactical Kits Funds

Azibaola Robert, Former president Goodluck Jonathan’s cousin, his wife, Stella and their company – One Plus Holding, shared to various companies the sum of $40million received from the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA). David Nkpe, a prosecution witness at the trial of Azibaola Robert, his wife, Stella and their company, One Plus Holding, revealed this at a resumed hearing in Abuja.

Azibaola and his co-accused allegedly diverted $40million (Forty Million United State Dollars) purportedly meant for supply of Tactical Communication kits for Special Forces which was transferred from the account of the ONSA with the Central Bank of Nigeria to the domiciliary account of their company, One Plus Holdings.

At the resumed sitting today, Nkpe told the court that, analysis of documents relating to ‘One Plus Holdings Nigeria Ltd’, showed that the company received the sum of $40million from ONSA.

According to him, investigation was extended to ONSA to ascertain the purpose for which the payment by Azibaola and his cohorts was made. “EFCC wrote to ONSA to avail them with documents regarding the payment mandate and the reply came”, Nkpe said.

According to him, the payment for that particular mandate was for the “Supply of Tactical Communication Kits for Special Forces”.

He went on: “We investigated the utilisation of the funds and discovered that the funds were transferred to other companies including Bureau de Change and some of the funds transferred offshore to countries like London and United Arab Emirates”.

Asked if he could recall some of the beneficiaries, Nkpe said that, “there were several of them, but I remember that $6.6mmillion was transferred to a company called ‘Karahyna’ between October 2014 and April 2015, which was specifically done in eight tranches. I also recall that the sum of $1.5million was transferred to ‘Reya Telecommunication’ which is a company under One Plus Holdings group.

He added that, “Another sum of $1.493million was transferred to ‘Kakatar El Ltd’ which is also a company under One Plus Holdings; a sum of $2million was transferred to ‘Capitafield Investment Ltd’ and another $330,000 transferred to a company called ‘Teledom’.”

The presiding judge, Justice Nnamdi Dimgba of the Federal High Court sitting in Maitama, Abuja, however, adjourned further hearing on the matter to July 7, 2017.

Nkpe is the tenth prosecution witness in the matter. According to him, investigation did not find any tactical communication kits procured from that fund. “Most of the companies that received the money did not supply any goods”, he said.

The witness said that, the analysis carried out on the account of the third defendant (One Plus Holdings) on September 9, 2014 showed that the $40m was the only major inflow into the account and from the time of that receipt, all the transactions in the account were outflows, which is the distribution of the said $40m.

Recall that on May 17, the then outgoing President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan had urged Nigerians to be magnanimous and forgive him of all his transgressions in the course of discharging his duties as president. But with such salacious details of his criminal embezzlement of public funds revealed at the trial of Azibaola Robert, it may be very hard for Nigerians to forgive him.

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