See why EFCC arrested Al-Makura: A serving Senator and former Governor of Nasarawa State Al-Makura and his wife were arrested by the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC ) on Wednesday, July 28.
The details of the allegations that led to the arrest of the couple, who were still being interrogated at the time of this report, have not been disclosed by the agency.
According to PREMIUM TIMES, sources familiar with some suspicious transactions involving the couple, their companies, including the Ta’al hotel in Lafia, and some businesses, said the EFCC arrested the couple on suspicion of involvement in dirty money flow.
When Mr Al-Makura was governor of Nasarawa State between 2011 and 2019, approximately 55 accounts controlled by the couple and their companies were involved in the suspicious transactions totalling billions of naira.
According to sources, less than $250 was deposited in one of the accounts in the two years preceding his assumption of office, but large deposits began flowing in an apparent structured pattern soon after he became governor.
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Many deposits into this and other domiciliary accounts were made by businesses alleged to have performed state government contracts.
“The transactions raised suspicion of money laundering or routing of proceeds of corruption,” one source said.
The sources added that the anti-graft agency could have found that the depositors were lodging bribes into the accounts.
In one case, one business entity paid over N200 million, broken into structured nine transactions, in a single day, August 9, 2016, into one of Mr Al-Makura’s accounts, this newspaper learnt.
Two weeks after, another business made similar transactions. There is also a case of huge transfers into a company owned by Mr Al-Makura and his wife by the state government.
According to PREMIUM TIMES, the reason for those transactions were not explained.
When contacted on Wednesday by PREMIUM TIMES, Mr Al-Makura’s spokesperson, Danjuma Joseph, said he was not aware of his principal’s travails.
However, EFCC has also not officially confirmed Mr Al-Makura’s arrest.
See why EFCC arrested Al-Makura…
