Ozhekome Ought To Have Reported Payment In Excess Of N10m To EFCC, Court Told

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has said that Chief Mike Ozekhome acted contrary to the law when he failed to inform the commission of the seventy-five million naira he claimed was paid to him as a legal fee by the governor of Ekiti state, Ayodele Fayose.

At the resumed hearing today on the application seeking an order to unfreeze the accounts of Ozekhome chambers EFCC counsel Rotimi Oyedepo said it is the law that lawyers must report to the EFCC when they receive payment more than 10 million naira.

Arguing before Justice Abdulazeez Anka of the Federal High Court in Ikoyi, Lagos, Oyedepo said Ozekhome committed an infraction of the law by failing to do so.

Chief Ozekhome in response, argued that is not the place of lawyers to report their payment to the commission but of the bank to alert the EFCC when they receive deposits more than ten million naira.

The Commission had claimed that the N75m paid into the account at Guaranty Trust Bank by Governor Fayose was a proceed of crime and that the senior lawyer reasonably ought to have known that he should not receive such money whether it was a legal fee or not.

Ozekhome argued that as a lawyer, he is entitled to his legal fees, stating that the account through which the money was transferred into his account has been unfrozen by an order of Justice Taiwo Taiwo of the Federal High Court in Ado-Ekiti.

“One of the reasons Justice Taiwo rejected EFCC’s application was that by section 36 of EFCC Act, the name of Fayose was not mentioned in the order earlier granted by Justice Muhammed Idris in Lagos,” he said, urging the court to expunge the paragraphs in the EFCC counter-affidavit that claimed that Fayose’s name was mentioned in the earlier order granted by Justice Idris.

Source: Saharareporters