APRIL 27, 2015 : ETIM EKPIMAH, Uyo
An Akwa Ibom State High Court has
convicted and sentenced a former
commissioner, representing Akwa Ibom State
on the board of the Niger Delta Development
Commission, Pastor Godwin Eyo, to three
years imprisonment.
Eyo was accused of stealing 56 transformers
meant for oil producing communities in the
state.
The accused was prosecuted by the Economic
and Financial Crimes Commission on 56
counts bordering on stealing and conversion
of 56 electricity transformers released to him
by NDDC for distribution to communities in
Akwa Ibom State.
On Monday in Uyo, he was found guilty on 37
of those counts by Justice Idongesit Ntem-
Isua and sentenced to three years
imprisonment on each of the counts.
He was however discharged and acquitted on
19 counts. The sentences are to run
concurrently.
The convict was said to have applied for 90
electricity transformers and four generators
from NDDC for Akwa Ibom State sometime in
February, 2006.
Approval was given for 70 transformers but
he allegedly diverted same to his house in
Eket on the pretext that there was no space
to accommodate the newly issued 70 units of
transformers at the NDDC office in Uyo.
He was thereafter said to have sent only 14
Units to NDDC office in Uyo while he withheld
56 units which he could not account for till
date.
The price of the 56 transformers are put at
N220, 176,320.
One of the counts reads, “That you Pastor
Godwin Moffat Eyo being a former Akwa
Ibom State representative on the Board of the
Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC)
on or about 14th April, 2006 at Uyo in the
Uyo Judicial Division did fraudulently steal a
300 KVA/33/0.415 Transformer Serial No.
1712496 valued at Four Million, Eighteen
Thousand, Five Hundred and Sixty Naira
(N4,018,560.00), property of NDDC and
thereby committed an offence of stealing
contrary to Section 399 and punishable under
Section 404 of the Criminal Code Cap. 38,
Volume 2, Laws of Akwa Ibom State, 2000.”


www.punchng.com/news/ex-nddc-commissioner-jailed-three-years-for-stealing-transformers/

Chai