Former Minister of State, Defence, Musiliu Obanikoro has accused the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) of plans to manufacture receipts from blank letter headed papers collected from his Lagos home.
He raised the alarm Friday evening through his media aide, Jonathan Eze.
Obanikoro who disclosed that the blank letter headed papers were among the things carted away during the raid of his home, added that the anti-graft agency was planning to use them to forge acknowledgement reciepts.
The former Minister is currently being investigated by EFCC alongside his sons over their alleged collection of N4.7billion from embattled former National Security Adviser (NSA) Colonel Sambo Dasuki.
“Recall that when the EFCC illegally raided my houses in Lagos, they went away with various documents which included blanked signed letter headed papers as testified in the Affidavit sworn in Court.
“It has however come to my notice that the EFCC has allegedly written an acknowledgement on one of the document purportedly as evidence that I collected the equivalent sum of one million dollars in cash from a Bureau De Change and signed for it.
“This is another lie from the pit of hell. How can anybody change money from a Bureau De Change and sign for it? I still insist that throughout my stay as Minister, I never collected any money from any Bureau De Change and as such, I urge the public to ignore the EFCC who are trying to skew up investigations in its favour.
“The EFCC has obviously betrayed public trust by its latest sinister plan of manufacturing receipt in my name. Instead of genuinely carrying out its mandate, it has been grossly overshadowed by political wiles,” he said.
Continuing, Obanikoro recalled a media report quoting EFCC they had evidence of his receiving the cash.
“The paper said: the owner of A.A. G. B. S Oil and Gas confirmed to us that the company is a BDC but was only bearing the name of an oil company. He confirmed that he received N168m from Sylvan McNamara and $1million was delivered to Obanikoro in cash while he was the Minister of State for Defence based on the exchange rate at the time. Obanikoro acknowledged receipt of the cash and we have recovered evidence.”
