By Olusegun Lawrence The trial of Senate President Bukola Saraki, continued on Wednesday at the Code of Conduct Tribunal, CCT in Abuja.
Mr Saraki is facing a 13-count charge bothering on false declaration of assets when he was Kwara state Governor.
According to the prosecution (EFCC) witness, Michael Wetkas, Mr. Saraki received salaries for four years after leaving office in May 2011.
He told the Tribunal that 87 lodgements were made by different individuals in one day into the defendant’s naira account on October 26, 2009.
The prosecution witness said “These payments were made to pay back the loans collected from the GTB bank. Before the payment, the account was in debit balance.”
According to Wetkas, different lodgements made was a deliberate ploy to by pass the Money pl?
Laundering Act, which frowns at single heavy lodgements.
Testifying further, he said deposit slips were erroneously filled and sometimes, one handwriting filled the slips.
The bank management also said the suspicious transactions were reported to the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit
The witness said that the EFCC became interested when it received five petitions out of which four were written by Kwara Freedom network in 2012 appealing to the agency to investigate the Management of revenue account of the 16 local government areas of the state.
So far, the tribunal has admitted 25 different documents as exhibits including Ex-Gov Saraki’s Access bank Salary account were the double salaries and pension were lodged.
The documents also linked him with Property acquired in Lagos, Abuja , United Kingdom and the United States of America while in office but which he failed to declare as part of his assets.
The case has been adjourned to April 18, 2016.
