BY Ebunoluwa Olafusi
A federal high court in Abuja has granted a request by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) to freeze bank accounts aid to be owned by Abdul’aziz Yari, former governor of Zamfara state.
The court also granted the agency’s request to freeze the accounts of Kayatawa Nigeria Limited and B.T. Oil and Gas Nigeria Limited, allegedly linked to him.
Ruling on an ex-parte motion filed by the ICPC on Friday, Taiwo Taiwo, the judge, ordered that the former governor’s accounts in Polaris and Zenith banks with funds in dollars and naira, be frozen pending the time the “affected person shows cause why the freezing order should be vacated”.
The judge also ordered ICPC to publish the order in a national daily within 14 days, asking the affected parties to show cause why the “funds should not be permanently forfeited to the federal government”.
The ICPC, through Osuobeni Akponimisingha, its lawyer, had filed the application following an intelligence report that Yari and the two companies “are involved in some unlawful activity against the interest of the Zamfara state government and by extension the federal government of Nigeria.”
The ICPC had alleged that Yari and the companies received various funds belonging to the state government through their accounts domiciled in the two commercial banks.
It said the funds in the accounts remained only $669,248 and N24,289,910 as of the time it filed the applications.
Earlier in August, operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had uncovered 21 exotic cars during a raid at the Talata-Mafara residence of the former governor.
The EFCC had raided Yari’s residence when he was out of the country. The anti-graft agency also searched the houses of Jafaru, Yari’s brother, and Sha’aya Mafara, his friend.
Yari is currently being investigated for alleged questionable payment of N19 billion from the London-Paris Club refund; N35 billion spent on internally displaced persons (IDPs); ecological and stabilisation fund and how he incurred N151,190,477,572.02 liabilities on ongoing projects.
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