Dr Doyin Okupe, director-general of the Peter Obi presidential campaign, was today convicted for breaching the money laundering act by a federal high court in Abuja has .
Trouble started for him in 2019 when the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) arraigned Okupe (alongside two companies – Value Trust Investment Ltd and Abrahams Telecoms Ltd.) on a 59-count charge of alleged N702 million money laundering and diversion of funds.
Okupe allegedly received cash from the office of the Sambo Dasuki-led National Security Adviser (NSA).
Delivering judgment on Monday, before Ijeoma Ojukwu, the presiding judge, who found Okupe guilty of contravening sections 16(1)&(2) of the Money Laundering Act by “accepting cash payments in excess of the threshold allowed under the act without going through a financial institution.”
The judge said the NSA is not a financial institution and although the former president allegedly authorised the funds, he did not specify a cash payment in violation of the Money Laundering Act.
“I find the first defendant, Dr. Doyin Okupe, guilty on counts 34, 35, 36 to 59,” the court ruled.
The judge however found the defendants not guilty in counts 1 to 33 on the grounds that the prosecution “failed to establish the charge of money laundering, criminal breach of trust and corruption against the NSA.”
However, Okupe was able to pay the sum of N13 million for the 52-year jail term bagged for N240 million money laundering offence.
The 26 counts, according to Justice Ojukwu, was to attract 2-year jail-term each, and they were to run concurrently, meaning, the convict would only spend two years in prison.
The judge, however, “gave an option of N500, 000 in each of the counts, amounting to N13 million, which must be paid before 4:30pm (the close of work) on Monday, failing which he would be taken to Kuje Correctional Centre to serve his prison term.