From Taiye Joseph, Ilorin
The trial of former Kwara State Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed, and his former Commissioner for Finance, Ademola Banu, on alleged ₦5.78 billion fraud charges, was on Thursday, adjourned to February 16, 2025, following proceedings at the Kwara State High Court sitting in Ilorin.
The defendants are standing trial before Justice Mahmud Abdulgafar, on charges preferred against them by the Ilorin Zonal Directorate of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), bordering on the alleged diversion of funds meant for basic education in the state.
At the resumed hearing, a key prosecution witness, Stanley Ujilibo, told the court that investigators obtained bank statements of the Kwara State Government, from Polaris Bank and Guaranty Trust Bank (GTBank), as part of efforts to trace the movement of the funds in question.
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Ujilibo, who appeared as the sixth prosecution witness, explained that the EFCC formally wrote to the management of the two banks requesting the state government’s statements of account during the period under investigation.
“My Lord, we wrote to the then Skye Bank, now Polaris Bank, and Guaranty Trust Bank to request the statements of accounts of the Kwara State Government,” he said while being led in evidence by prosecution counsel, Rotimi Jacobs, SAN.
According to the witness, the letters, dated August 1, were duly acknowledged by the banks, which later supplied the requested documents.
He added that the statements were tendered before the court and admitted as exhibits.
The EFCC has alleged that the former governor and his finance commissioner approved the use of Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) matching grant funds, to pay salaries and pensions, an action the Commission said violated the terms under which the funds were released.
The anti-graft agency maintained that the UBEC matching grants and the required counterpart funds, representing 50 per cent of the total allocation, were meant strictly for the provision of classrooms and other basic infrastructure in primary and junior secondary schools across the 16 local government areas of Kwara State.
At an earlier sitting, a former Accountant-General of the state, Suleiman Ishola, who served between 2013 and 2019, had told the court that ₦1 billion from the UBEC matching grant was borrowed by the Ahmed administration in 2015 to offset salary and pension obligations.
Ujilibo further disclosed that the EFCC also acted on a petition from the Kwara State Government, which led to additional correspondence with the Ministry of Finance and the Office of the Accountant-General during the course of the investigation.
However, proceedings were briefly stalled when the prosecution attempted to tender responses from the Ministry of Finance and the Office of the Accountant-General. Defence counsel, led by Kamaldeen Ajibade, objected, arguing that the documents had not been properly arranged and highlighted for ease of reference.
After listening to arguments from both sides, Justice Abdulgafar adjourned the case to February 16, 2025, for the continuation of trial.
