EFCC Is Criticized By Ekiti PDP For Releasing Buhari’s Associate

The Ekiti State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has criticized the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for releasing an associate of President Muhammadu Buhari, Jafaru Isa who was linked with the infamous $2.1bn arms deal fraud.

The EFCC released Isa after he returned N100 million out of the N170 million he received from former National Security Adviser (NSA), Sambo Dasuki, who is being tried for spearheading the scam.

The Ekiti PDP accused the EFCC of being partial in its war against corruption and targeting only members of the PDP.

This position was contained in a statement released by its Publicity Secretary, Jackson Adebayo on Wednesday, January 13, 2016.

It reads in part:

“The whole thing was like a drama from Nollywood, where you can see the end of a film from the beginning. The arrest, purported refund of N100m by Isa and his eventual release was a charade taken too far.”

“The EFCC and the Federal Government should explain to the world what the money collected by Isa was meant for, as was done to other cases since the beginning of the indiscriminate arrest and perpetual detention of the PDP members in the same category.”

Dasuki is at the center of the massive money laundering investigation and is alleged to have supervised the looting of the funds which were meant for the procurement of arms for Nigeria’s military.

He was arrested by the Department of State Services (DSS) on December 1, 2015 and handed over to the EFCC the day after.

The former NSA is reported to have implicated several prominent persons in the deal including former governors, ex-ministers and members of the PDP.

Dasuki’s lawyer however denied the report that his client had become an informant while the former NSA said that ex-President, Goodluck Jonathan was aware of the transactions he had made.

Jonathan has however denid authorizing the release of the stated funds despite the former NSA’s claim that he got the necessary presidential approval for the transactions.

Dasuki was released on bail from Kuje Prison in December 2015 but was soon re-arrested by the DSS.