Justice Chukwujekwu aneke of the Federal High Court, Lagos, has fixed feb. 13 for the arraignment of the Group Chairman of Honeywell Group, Oba Otudeko, as well as the former Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director of First Bank Plc, Stephen Olabisi Onasanya, and two others on an alleged 12.3 billion fraud.
the other two defendants are a former board member of Honeywell Soji Akintayo and a firm, Anchorage Leisure Limited
Their arraignment had initially been fixed for Monday Jan 20. But none of the defendants were present in court.
They were however all represented by their respective counsel who told the court that they were not served with the court processes by the prosecuting agency, the economic and financial crimes commission.
But the EFCC lead counsel, Rotimi Oyedepo, SAN, said in response that between the 16th-19th of January, it took steps to ensure that the defendants were produced in court for their arraignment but they couldn’t be reached.
The EFCC has now gotten the nod of the court to serve the defendants by leaving the documents at the last known addresses of the defendants.
Only the counsel to the 2nd defendant, adeyinka olumide-fusika SAN accepted service of the court documents in open court, saying his client is ready to defend himself of all the accusations.
According to the EFCC, the four defendants committed the alleged fraud in tranches of N5.2 billion, N6. 2 billion, N1.5 billion and N500 million, between 2013 and 2014 in Lagos.
Among other alleged offences, They are accused of conspiring “to obtain the sum of N12.3 billion from First Bank Limited on the pretence that the said sum represented credit facilities applied for by V-Tech Dynamic Links Limited and Stallion Nigeria Limited, which representation they knew to be false.
