A new twist emerged in an alleged money laundering case levelled against Governor Joshua Dariye of Plateau State, when a London Court found guilty, convicted and sentenced the embattled governor's alleged accomplice, Mrs. Joyce Bamidele Oyebanjo to three years imprisonment.
The jail term, handed down by a Southwark Crown Court Magistrate to Oyebanjo, a housing tenancy manager, from Teresa Gardens, Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, UK, marked a first conviction by the Proceeds of Corruption Unit of the London Metropolitan Police in their investigation of Dariye.
According to the British High Commission information chief in Nigeria, Mr. Graeme Bannatyne, the London Police started work on four cases with the Serious Fraud Office and made its first arrests in January.
The Metropolitan Police, he said, had responded to requests from the Nigerian Government relating to two former State Governors Joshua Dariye and Diepreye Alamieyeseigha.
Bannatyne claimed that in one case £1 million has been returned, and in the other, a property bought in London, which was frozen by the UK police under the 2002 Proceeds of Crime Act, is now to be sold so that the funds can be returned to the people of Nigeria from whom they were allegedly stolen.
40-year old Oyebanjo was sentenced after having been found guilty of money laundering £1.4m of money stolen from Nigerian State funds; after she was investigated by the Metropolitan Police Proceeds of Corruption Unit, which was specifically created to investigate the laundering of criminal funds in London by corrupt overseas officials.



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