The State Security Service (SSS) has claimed in court documents recently acquired by PULSENETS that the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, has been paying “unknown gunmen” and members of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
The documents give the SSS’s missing information about the terrorism funding accusation against Mr. Emefiele for the first time.
The separatist group IPOB wants to create an independent Biafra nation out of the five Igbo-dominated states that make up South-East Nigeria and some of the neighbouring states.
As far back as September 2017, a court proclaimed and outlawed the gang that has been held responsible for violent crimes in the South-east area in previous years.
In December, the Nigerian media, particularly PULSENETS, revealed SSS’s fruitless attempt to get a Federal High Court in Abuja order for Mr. Emefiele’s arrest due to a variety of claims, including funding of terrorism.
After hearing from the attorneys representing SSS, Chief Judge John Tsoho of the Federal High Court declined to accept the request for an injunction against Mr. Emefile.
In a decision issued on December 9th, the judge denied the application, noting an error in the SSS’s application’s method of operation.
Only 11 days after the judgement was handed down by the court did the Nigerian media, including PULSENETS, learn about it.
However, the stories were silent on the serious accusations made against Mr. Emefiele by the agency.
PULSENETS has finally received the SSS’s court documents, which reveal stunning details of the agency’s accusations against the CBN governor, eight weeks after the court issued its ruling.
The SSS accused him of undermining President Muhammadu Buhari’s government, funding terrorism, supporting terrorism, and engaging in other economic crimes that had the consequence of compromising Nigeria’s national security.
The agency particularly charged Mr. Emefiele with mismanaging the CBN subsidiary NISRAL and the Anchor Borrowers Program.
Request Detention
On December 7th, a team of four lawyers from the SSS legal division submitted their complaint against Mr. Emefiele.
However, in contrast to earlier reports that said the application was for an order to have Mr. Emefiele arrested, it actually asked for authorization to hold Mr. Emefile for 60 days in order to wrap up an ongoing investigation into his alleged atrocities.
Because the application was submitted as an ex parte motion, Mr. Emefile was not served with it.
It was backed up by an affidavit signed by SSS employee Umar Salihu, who summarised the findings of the serious offences Mr. Emefiele is claimed to have committed.
The deponent said “there is reasonable suspicion that the respondent (Mr Emefiele) was involved in terrorism financing, aiding and abetting acts of terrorism, economic crimes of national security dimension and for undermining the security of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”
He said the agency needed to apply to the court “for an order enabling the applicant to detain the respondent for sixty days, pending the conclusion of ongoing investigation …”
On the need for the court to issue the order, he said Mr Emefiele “is a man of means and can easily evade arrest and interfere with ongoing investigation if he is released on bail.”
Citing “credible intelligence”, the deponent mentioned some specific allegations over which the agency was investigating Mr Emefiele.
The charges made in the application are vague and give no indication as to why the CBN governor would have supported the actions of IPOB and other terrorists.The charges made in the application are vague and give no indication as to why the CBN governor would have supported the actions of IPOB and other terrorists.
Terrorism Funding and IPOB
The SSS accused Mr. Emefiele of supporting terrorism, arming unidentified gunmen who terrorised the South-east area, sponsoring the IPOB and its armed wing, and the Eastern Security Network, among other horrifying accusations (ESN).
The SSS said that Mr. Emefiele sponsored them using money taken from government coffers as well as monies he earned for his unsuccessful presidential attempt the previous year.
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As the current governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Emefiele made a contentious run for the party’s presidential nomination last year. Prior to the party’s primary election, pictures of his campaign cars and other materials appeared online.
Additionally, he applied to the Federal High Court in Abuja for a ruling upholding his eligibility to compete for the APC ticket. However, on May 9, the court disregarded Mr. Emefiele’s request.
The Nigeria’s spy agency said in its filing in December that Mr Emefiele “procures a number of vehicles and disbursed funds for his botched presidential ambition.”
It added that “the said funds and vehicles are being channelled into funding of Unknown Gunmen, Eastern Security Network (ESN) and elements of IPOB, a proscribed organisation.”
In addition, the agency said Mr Emefiele, “on several occasions in actions prejudicial to the security of the Nigerian state,” engaged in “criminal conspiracy to divert government resources into suspicious acts of terrorism financing”.
It said that the CBN governor’s actions were “meant to subvert and sabotage” the presidency of President Muhammadu Buhari.
But despite the seriousness of the accusations, which come from the government’s premier intelligence service, Mr. Buhari has continued to meet privately with Mr. Emefiele since December. This raises concerns about the president’s attitude toward the “credible intelligence” the SSS claimed to have regarding the head banker of the country.
When the SSS connected Mr. Emefiele to the funding of the outlawed organisation in December, it was keeping IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu in jail. The SSS is at the vanguard of the government’s attempts to suppress separatist activities across the nation.
The SSS, the Presidency, or Mr. Emefiele have not responded to the claims.
Fraud, Manipulation of Interventionist Funding, and Money Laundering
Also charged by the SSS were “fraud, money laundering, round-tripping, and conferring of financial benefit to self and others” on Mr. Emefiele.
According to the SSS, Mr. Emefiele is also implicated in the improper management of many government interventionist monies that are under his management.
The SSS accused Mr. Emefiele of mismanaging funds from the Anchor Borrowers Scheme and the Social Investment Programme (NISRAL). The two organisations are interventionist programmes designed to increase food production and support farmers.
Additionally, the SSS charged Mr. Emefiele with mismanaging “other important economic areas of the economy.”
Emefiele’s Syndicate
The SSS made the astounding assertion that it was pursuing members of a criminal organisation, of whom Mr. Emefiele is reportedly a member.
According to the statement “investigation is still ongoing on a wider scale as other members of the syndicate chain need to be identified and arrested to enable successful prosecution.”
In addition to charging Mr. Emefiele with supporting terrorism, the agency said that he employed go-betweens from his alleged gang “to carry out his illicit economic crimes of national security dimension with significant threat to the country’s security.”
Why the court denied SSS’s application
However, the court, Mr. Tsoho, cited a weakness in the process used by the agency to get an order for Mr. Emefiele’s 60-day detention when he rejected SSS’ plea on December 9, 2022.
He asserted that the suspect should have been taken into custody without a court warrant prior to the secret police making their request.
“This is not the situation here, as Godwin Emefiele, the CBN governor was shown on television, even last night, having an audience with the President of Nigeria,” the judge said. “It therefore seems that the applicant intends to use the court as a cover for an irregular procedure which is unacceptable.”
The judge said “an application of this kind (by the SSS) should have evidence of the approval of the respondent (Emefiele’s) boss (President Buhari), that such measures are authorised to be taken,” owing to the “sensitive position” he “occupies…as one of the key drivers of the nation’s economy.”
“I decline to grant this application ex parte,” the judge declared.
Nigerian Senior Advocate Femi Falana claimed that the charges made by the SSS against Mr. Emefiele had caused investors to lose faith in the country’s economy.
The senior lawyer told PULSENETS over the phone: “Nobody will want to do business with your country while the governor of the Central Bank is a terrorist suspect.”
Lamido Sanusi, a former Emir of Kano, was also accused of supporting terrorism by the Goodluck Jonathan-led administration in 2014 and ousted from power, Mr. Falana remembered.
Olisa Agbakoba, a former president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), praised the judge for rejecting what he called “the worthless plea by the SSS to arrest the CBN governor” and tasked the secret police with suing Mr. Emefiele if “there is evidence.”
Governor of CBN and his problems
Nigerians widely denounced Mr. Emefiele’s entry into politics last year, when he ran for the APC presidential nomination while still serving as the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria.
One of the reliable sources that originally revealed Mr. Emefiele’s secret presidential campaign was a PULSENETS editorial, which urged him to either openly deny it or leave from his position right now so he could follow his political ambitions.
The CBN continues to get flak for subjecting Nigerians to hardships brought on by a lack of the recently issued naira notes. Nigerians requested the CBN governor to change the policy after complaining about the lack of fresh naira notes.
At Automated Teller Machines, the sole location where cash can be withdrawn, the redesigned 200, 500, and 1000 notes are difficult to find.
However, many have argued that Mr. Emefiele’s 10-day extension from the original deadline of January 31 to February 10 is insufficient to remedy the severe shortage of the new notes.
Bola Tinubu, the APC’s presidential candidate, criticised the limited supply of the new bank notes and added that it was a plot to undermine his prospects of winning the election in a covert allusion to monetary policy.
Mr. Emefiele said that old naira notes will still be accepted by banks even after the deadline of 10 February when testifying before the House of Representatives.
Joshua Alobo, a law lecturer, has sued the CBN to request a deadline extension.
The introduction of newly designed 200, 500, and 1,000 naira notes into the financial system was announced by the apex bank on October 26, 2022.
But because so many people are lining up at ATMs to withdraw cash, getting access to the new notes still seems impossible.
