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The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on Monday, told a Federal High Court, sitting in Abuja and presided over by Justice Donatus Okorowa that a former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, standing trial on a 16 count charge bordering on contract inflation and fraudulent embezzlement of public funds totaling N9billion, is in breach of certain sections of the Procurement Act and therefore has a case to answer.
EFCC counsel, Festus Keyamo, urged the court to dismiss two motions brought by Bankole’s counsel, Adegboyega Awomolo, SAN seeking to quash the charges against him and to disqualify Keyamo from prosecuting the case. While moving his motion, Keyamo pointed out that Sections 57 and 58 of the Procurement Act clearly emphasized? that? ‘all other parties’ other than those mentioned such as contractor and procurement officers, can be prosecuted within that provision.
He further argued that parties to the offence can be those that have the authority to stop the commission of a crime,? as in the case of Bode George and others. “My Lord there is a striking similarity between this case and that of Bode George because the same arguments were made for them stating that they were not procurement officers but board members. Our argument then and even now, is that Section 7 of the criminal Code recognizes other parties who in one way or the other may have aided or abetted a crime.”?
Keyamo, while replying to the issue of showing two prices, stated that the prosecution detailed out, in its charges, the two prices that were contradictory and has been generous and magnanimous in its proof of evidence so as not to be seen as persecutors but prosecutors.
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