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Loan repayment: Nothing wrong receiving $2.2m from Adoke, witness tells court

A former Acting Managing Director of Unity Bank, Rislanudeen Muhammed, yesterday told the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja that there was nothing wrong with receiving $2.2million cash from a former Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Bello Adoke, SAN as repayment of the loan owed the bank by the former minister.

 

Adoke is standing trial alongside Aliyu Abubakar in an amended 14 amended counts of money laundering instituted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. Muhammed, who is currently a banker with the Bank of Industry, is the second prosecution witness in the ongoing trial.

 

The prosecution had alleged that Adoke, sometime in 2013, in Abuja, “made a cash payment of $2,267,400 to Risslanudeen Muhammed” and thereby “committed an offence contrary to the combined effect of section 16(1)(d) and of section 19a) of the Money Laundering Prohibition Act, 2011 (as amended) and punishable under section 16(2)(b) of the same Act”.

 

But Muhammed had testified on August 13, 2020, under cross-examination by Adoke’s counsel, Kanu Agabi, SAN that the $2.2m transaction did not constitute proceeds of any criminal offence.

 

However, at the resumed cross-examination, Muhammed insisted that the said money was not a proceed of crime. Muhammed told the court that after receiving the $2.2million from Adoke, it was kept with the Abuja branch manager of the Unity Bank, and later handed to a Bureau de Change operator for conversion to naira.

 

He added that after the money was converted, the naira equivalent was paid into Adoke’s account with the bank and subsequently used to liquidate the debt. According to him: “I am fully aware of all the transactions in respect of the loan payment. I did not report any suspicion to the bank, EFCC, ICPC, NFIU, and SSS because there was nothing suspicious.

 

“The bank did not reprimand me for the transaction because it was transparent and I acted as an agent of the bank when I collected the money.”

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