The Financial and Monetary Crimes Fee (EFCC) has escalated efforts to apprehend former Kogi State Governor Yahaya Bello by requesting INTERPOL in three North African international locations—Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria—to put him on a watch-list. This transfer, reported over the weekend, is a part of a broader technique based mostly on credible intelligence to make sure Bello’s presence at an upcoming courtroom listening to.
Further international locations the place Bello has been placed on the watch-list embrace Egypt, Libya, and Sudan. Sources throughout the anti-graft company disclosed that a number of choices are being thought of to deal with the state of affairs, together with a possible raid on the Kogi State Authorities Home in Lokoja, the place Bello is believed to be hiding.
The watch-list activation comes forward of the previous governor’s anticipated courtroom look on July seventeenth earlier than a Federal Excessive Court docket in Abuja. Bello faces a 19-count cost for alleged cash laundering, breach of belief, and misappropriation of public funds totaling roughly ₦80.2 billion.
Regardless of denying the allegations, Bello has repeatedly failed to look earlier than the trial decide, Justice Emeka Nwite, on June thirteenth and June twenty seventh. On the final listening to, he filed an utility in search of to switch his trial to the Federal Excessive Court docket in Lokoja.
An EFCC supply commented on the state of affairs, saying, “Forward of the subsequent listening to of the case, EFCC has activated many choices, together with taking a concrete motion to watch-list Bello in North Africa. We’re conscious of a botched exit to Morocco through Cameroon. We’re decided to cease him from occurring exile.”
The supply additional revealed that the EFCC Government Chairman, Mr. Ola Olukoyede, was in Tunisia after attending a session on illicit monetary flows in Singapore. There, he met with the heads of INTERPOL in North Africa to debate the intelligence on Bello, formally requesting his placement on a Crimson Alert within the area—a request that was accepted.
“He might be arrested in any a part of North Africa,” the supply affirmed. “We took this step as a result of we suspect that he had been biding time to keep away from arraignment. We count on Bello to be in courtroom to show his innocence. The EFCC has to do its work to keep away from setting a foul precedent.”
Over the last courtroom listening to, Bello’s lawyer, Adeola Adedipe (SAN), utilized to withdraw his look for the ex-governor. Adedipe additionally knowledgeable the courtroom of an utility earlier than the Chief Choose of the Federal Excessive Court docket to switch the case (no: FHC/ABJ/CR/98/2024) to Lokoja, citing Part 45 of the Federal Excessive Court docket Institution Act.
