In continuation of the Emefiele Trial, the EFCC on March 11,2024, presented Mr Micheal Agboro , a Director of ICPC as witness in the trial.
Under cross examination by Mathew Burkaa , the defendant’s Lead Counsel, the ICPC witness admitted Emefiele did not confer any unfair, corrupt advantage on himself because he was not a director or shareholder or an account signatory in April1616 limited and Architekon Nigeria limited and also because there is no evidence of any payment made to Emefiele by these companies in the course of performing his duties at the CBN.
He therefore admitted that the defendant did not enjoy any financial benefits from the jobs awarded.
Mr Agboro, further confirmed that he did not visit the contract sites to verify if the jobs were done. He also confirmed that he was not aware of the contract / procurement processes in the CBN, though evidence presented during the investigations reveal that the contracts were duly executed by the contractors and completion certificates issued.
Upon being questioned if he thought it was wrong for payments to be made to the contractors after jobs had been completed, Mr Agboro confirmed that it was not inappropriate to make such payments.
As regards Procurement Procedures in CBN, the witness admitted that he was aware that the CBN has the Major Contracts Tenders Committee (MCTC) and the COG that awards contracts based on their approval limits. He therefore confirmed that he was aware that the vetting,, of companies , review, and award of contracts is handled by the Procurement department and the MCTC .
He confirmed further that he is aware that the Governor of the CBN is not a member of the department and MCTC.
The witness further confirmed that , in the course of the investigation, the team did not see any documents/ official communication where the Governor directed any person or department to award any jobs to any company.
Upon further cross examination regarding the number of people that treats a document for a final award of contracts, the witness confirmed that there are up to 10 persons that minutes on a contract document; whereas only the defendant, out of 10 that is standing trial.