Special adviser to President Bola Tinubu on information and strategy Bayo Onanuga on Friday said the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Godwin Emefiele would have been facing a firing squad if he had committed the offences he is accused of in China.
Several damning allegations have been made against Mr Emefiele in a report by a private investigator Jim Obazee submitted to President Tinubu on Wednesday.
Tinubu appointed Obazee to probe the CBN after suspending Emefiele from his job as governor of the apex bank in June.
Mr Obazee said he discovered 593 bank accounts located in the United States, United Kingdom and China in which the CBN, under Emefiele, kept Nigerian funds without authorisation by the board and investment committee of the bank.
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In the UK alone, the special investigator said his probe led him to 543.4 million Pounds kept by Emefiele in fixed deposit accounts. He also said Emefiele manipulated the naira exchange rate and perpetrated fraud in the e-Naira project of the CBN.
Obazee said N1.7 billion was also spent on questionable legal fees on 19 cases that are directly traceable to the naira redesign and reconfiguration agenda.
The investigator also reported his discovery of the theft of $6.23 million from the vault of the CBN between February 7 and 8 this year, about two weeks before the presidential and National Assembly polls, under a purported approval of the president for the release of money to pay foreign election observers.
Reacting to the discoveries, Onanuga said via X, “If Godwin Emefiele and his gang had committed these egregious misappropriations in China, they will by now be facing the firing squad for high treason.”
