Federal High Court in Abuja has issued an order freezing the bank accounts of 32 individuals and companies allegedly linked to the #EndBadGovernance protests that took place across Nigeria.
The court’s ruling, delivered by Justice Emeka Nwite, was in response to an ex-parte motion filed by the Inspector-General of Police’s counsel, Ibrahim Mohammed.
The order also directs banks to arrest and detain account holders or anyone found transacting business on the affected accounts, pending investigation and prosecution, NAN reports.
Mr Nwite, who granted the motion dated and filed on August 20, directed the banks to contact the Nigeria Police Force through the telephone numbers: 08035179870 and 07032449912 as soon as arrest is made.
“That the banks are hereby directed by this honourable court to issue details of the account package(s) and to place a Post-No-Debit (PND) on the accounts, disable the ATM while allowing inflow into the said accounts as from the date of this court order,” the judge declared.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that though the ruling was made on Thursday, the certified true copy of the order was sighted on Sunday in Abuja.
The account numbers affected include 4010073491 (Fidelity Bank), 1255130019 (Access Bank), 0006084167 (Abbey Mortgage Multipurpose Bank Plc), 0821931299 (FCMB), 1012007655 (FCMB), 0000575573 (A AG Mortgage Bank Plc), 1007871587 (UBA), 2037117333 (UBA), 5421031104 (ECOBANK), 0024541201 (Union Bank), 1022899050 (UBA), 8755008491 (Branch International Services Ltd), 5630208636 (Fidelity), and 4936992542 (Fairmoney Microfinance Bank).
Others are 8755008499 (Branch International Financial Services Ltd), 2088228208 (UBA), 2115678044 (Zenith Bank), 3041823452 (First Bank), 1011828445 (New Edge Finance), 3024402748 (First Bank), 0161502459 (GTBank), 0040580047 (Access Bank), 0250291788 (Wema Bank), 6112464260 (Branch International Financial Services Ltd), 1000774097 (Sparkle Microfinance Bank Ltd), 3434649965 (Fairmoney Microfinance Bank), 2013556714 (KUDA Microfinance Bank), 3104962864 (Polaris Bank), 6112464267 (Branch International Finance Services Lit), 8137051249 (OPAY) and 8137051249 (PALMPAY).
The Inspector General of Police, in the application marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1219/2024, listed PA.LIN.HO Global Service Ltd, Innocent Angel Lovet Chinyere Nkiru, Obidient Movement Multipurpose Cooperative Society, Innocent Angel Lovet, Great Communicators Champion Multipurpose Cooperative Society Ltd as the 1st to 5th respondents respectively
Others include Great Communicators Champion Multipurpose Cooperative Society Ltd, Opaluwa Eleojo Bob-Simon, NUEE State Chapter, Adeyemi Abiodun Abayomi, Adaramoye Michael Tobiloba, Popoola Festus as 6th to 11th respondents respectively.
Mr Mohammed, in his four-ground argument, said the accounts as contained in the schedule in respect of which reliefs sought are subject of investigation and are reasonably suspected to be warehousing proceeds of unlawful activities or fraud.
“If there is any dealing with the account by way of withdrawal or transfer to another account by the persons under investigation/investigator and the persons that have absolute power to deal with the account will render nugatory any consequential order(s) which the court may make at the conclusion of this application,” he said.
The Inspector-General of Police’s counsel alleged that the frozen accounts were utilized for illicit activities, including criminal conspiracy, terrorism financing, treasonable felony, cyberbullying, and cyberstalking.
He claimed that funds were unlawfully transferred into these accounts, which are now linked to accused individuals who are currently at large.
“That the accused persons were involved in hosting another country’s flag in order to undermine the sovereignty of Nigerian state,” he added.
In the affidavit in support of the motion ex-parte, Gregory Woji, a detective attached to Force Criminal Investigation Department, deposed that preliminary investigation revealed that some suspects arrested were being recruited by some financiers to cause mayhem and destroyed life and property,
Mr Woji said preliminary investigation further revealed that the financiers were sending money to recruit the indigents and other vulnerable individuals to carry banners and overthrow a democratically elected government.
Further preliminary investigation, according to the counsel, has uncovered that certain foreign nationals played a key role in the reprehensible acts of treasonable felony and terrorism financing in Nigeria.
He stated that the actions of the accused individuals are tantamount to criminal conspiracy, terrorism financing, treasonable felony, cyberstalking, and cyberbullying, and are therefore punishable offenses.
Mr. Woji emphasized that it is the police’s duty to prevent this illegal activity by arresting the perpetrators, as an offense against one is an offense against all.
He stated that intelligence reports indicate that the suspects are attempting to transfer or withdraw funds from the accounts, and if this court does not grant this order, the investigation will be compromised.
“That it will be in the interest of justice to grant this request by freezing the account of the said suspects and order their immediate arrest on sighting them pending the outcome of the investigation and possible prosecution,” he said.
