Date: 2016-11-08

Trial of the Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki, resumed before the Code of Conduct Tribunal, CCT, in Abuja, yesterday, with the star witness, Mr. Michael Wetkas, revealing how the defendant acquired various properties with bank loans he secured while in office as the Governor of Kwara State.

Wetkas, who is a detective with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, was the head of a three-man crack team that was constituted in 2014 to investigate six separate petitions against Saraki. The witness commenced his Evidence-In-Chief before the tribunal on April 6.

Saraki Testifying at the resumed sitting yesterdy, he told the Justice Danladi Umar-led tribunal that Saraki, who is answering to a 16-count charge preferred against him by the Federal Government, used bank loans to the tune of N496 million, to purchase properties in Lagos.

He said Saraki earlier admitted in the assets declaration form he submitted before the Code of Conduct Bureau, in 2007, that he bought the disputed properties at plot 17 and 17A, Clover Road, in Lagos, with loan from Guarantee Trust Bank.

Under cross-examination by Saraki's lawyer, Mr. Paul Usoro, SAN, the witness said the defendant, who initially stated in his assets form dated July 11, 2007, that he took loan to buy the properties, made a U-turn after four years and claimed that same properties were declared to have been acquired with proceeds from his commodity business.

When asked to read the bank statement of the defendant, the witness, told the tribunal that the loans obtained to purchase the properties in dispute were liquidated prior to assets declaration Saraki made in 2011.

He said that repayment of the loans were made in five tranches between May 2007 and May, 2008. "The first payment was made in May 2007, the second was August 2, 2007, the next was November 2, 2007, the next was February 1, 2008, and the last one was paid on May 2, 2008."

When asked if he had any evidence that the funds used to repay the loan was from the Kwara State government, the witness said he was not aware. He, however, insisted that the manner the loans were repaid contravened the money laundering Act. Besides, the prosecution counsel, Mr. Rotimi Jacobs, SAN, drew attention of the tribunal to the fact that investigations had revealed that funds that were used to repay the loans emanated from Kwara State.

Jacobs stressed that some of the people Saraki used to lodge funds in a GTB account, admitted that he gave them the money at the Kwara State government house. Earlier in the proceeding, Usoro, SAN, referred the witness to counts two and three of the charges against Saraki, which accused him of false declaration of assets while in office as Kwara State Governor, as well as using his position as governor to abuse the rights of people of the state.

The witness, maintained that aside the two aforementioned properties, Saraki also acquired five other assets he claimed to have acquired with proceeds from sales of rice and sugar. He, however, noted that the said properties were all acquired by Saraki before he became governor in 2003. "For instance, the first property was acquired in 1990, the second was in 1996, the third was in 1991, the fourth was in 1992, the fifth was in the year, 2002, while the last property in question was bought in 2006", Wetkas stated.

He said: "After the end of tenure, by law, he was supposed to make another declaration on assumption of his second tenure, and going through the exhibit four, the declaration form read July 11, 2007, and going through the form, on page five, the property was declared and equally indicated as having been acquired with bank loan for N496 million."

The witness said he neither investigated Kwara State Government fund nor the business structure of the Senate President. He also admitted that Carlisle Properties and Investment Limited, a private company and not Saraki as an individual, acquired some of the properties. Government had in the charge before the tribunal, alleged that Saraki made false/anticipatory declaration of assets, operated foreign accounts while in office as Kwara State governor between 2003 and 2011, as well as collected governorship salary four years after his tenure had elapsed.