How ex-acting accountant-general allegedly diverted defence ministry’s funds through cash withdrawals

A prosecution witness recounted on Monday how a former Director, Finance and Account in the Federal Ministry of Defence, Chukwunyere Anamekwe Nwabuoku, who later acted as the Accountant-General of the Federation for two months, allegedly diverted the ministry’s funds through a torrent of cash withdrawals.

Testifying at the Federal High Court in Abuja, where Mr Nwabuoku is facing money laundering charges, Gudi Johnson, who is an investigator with the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), narrated how the defendant deposited the funds into multiple company accounts.

His team, which investigated the matter, wrote to the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) and the banks involved.

The analysis of the CAC report and bank statements, he said, showed that there were inflows of money from the Ministry of Defence to the companies.

“We commenced an interview with him, and he was cautioned and his statement taken virtually and physically. We showed him all the payments we saw, he said it was from quarterly release from the federal government into the Ministry’s accounts for security,” Mr Johnson, the ninth prosecution witness.

“Analysis showed that as soon as funds were deposited into the accounts, it was diverted and withdrawn by Gideon Joseph. The cash withdrawn would be deposited by Gideon into the account of M. Daddy`s Ltd.

“One Jerry Nwachukwu was called who came and told the committee that the money was deposited at the instance of the defendant and N355miilion was deposited. The defendant told us earlier that N100million was his only interest in the funds. One hundred and fifty million naira was also identified to be moved from M. Daddy`s account to Quantum Zenith Ltd.”

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is prosecuting Mr Nwabuoku, on nine counts of money laundering involving about N868.5 million.

In the charges filed in May 2024 and later amended from 11 to nine counts, EFCC accused Mr A of perpetrating the alleged fraud while serving in the defence ministry as Director, Finance and Account, between 2019 and 2021.

Mr Anamekwe allegedly committed the crimes prior to his appointment as acting Accountant-General of the Federation in May 2022. He served for only about two months in the acting capacity before his removal in July 2022.

Testifying as the ninth prosecution witness on Monday, Mr Johnson narrated how investigations into the alleged fraud was triggered by intelligence report from the Ministry of Defence.

He told the court that intelligence pointed to transactions involving Trans Afro Limited, Torch Global Limited, Teemell Limited, among others.

“We discovered that one Gideon Joseph was registered as a director in these companies,” the witness said.

“His address was Louis Street, Maitama, and Kubwa. We invited him to answer as to what business he carried out. All the letters could not be delivered so we resorted to the Ministry of Defence where we invited the Director of Accounts, one Mr Felix to throw more light. He told us that he acted on the directives of the Director of Finance (the defendant).”

The witness also said other persons were called and they said they were instructed to withdraw the monies they received into the accounts of Teemell, Touch Global and Transactional Afro Nig. Ltd.

“It was on this note that we invited the Director of Finance and Accounts (the defendant). We then asked him the source of the funds and purpose and he told us that they were all payments for security operations which he said could not disclose because they were classified information. On that note we wrote to the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA),” Mr Johnson said.

He said all documents were submitted to ONSA informing the agency of his team’s findings.

He added that “a committee was set up including Monguno, Professor Bolagi Orasanye, me, Bellozi Adama from EFCC etc. We were told to investigate the matter.”

According to the witness, further analysis showed that the sum of N13mmillion was transferred to El Salen Ltd for property purchase and N10million for the purchase of a power generating set.

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“On this, we obtained records from City Gate Homes, showing a property of N65 million linked to the defendant which we told him that these are proceeds of crime which must be recovered. We inspected the house at City Gates homes and seized the keys, the defendant also said he had investment prior to his involvement. We wrote to the Code of Conduct Bureau and they said there was no information on his assets,” he said.

Letters from ONSA, dated January 18 and 20 January 2022 were marked and admitted as ‘Exhibit PwJ’ and ‘K’ respectively. The Remita response was marked ‘Exhibit L’, the Code of Conduct Bureau response was marked as ‘Exhibit M’, EFCC letter to the Code of Conduct was marked “Exhibit N” and the CAC response was marked ‘Exhibit O’. The letter dated 10 April 2025 from Zenith Bank to EFCC was marked “PW R”, and lastly the letter from Access was marked ‘PW S’.

The matter was adjourned till 22 and 23 May for continuation of hearing.