The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has withdrawn the alleged money laundering suit it filed at the Federal High Court against Lagos Speaker Mudashiru Ajayi Obasa.

Naija News understands that the anti-graft did not give any particular reason for its application for withdrawal.

Following the application to withdraw, Justice Nicholas Oweibo discharged the ‘lien/Post No Debit’ placed on Obasa’s three accounts in Standard Chartered Bank.

The accounts are (US Dollars) 0001852063; (Current) 0001852056 and (Saving) 5002309624.

The judge also set aside the ex-parte orders he made on September 15, 2020, which led to the freezing of the accounts.

Recall that the court on September 15, 2020, granted an interim order freezing Obasa’s accounts following the EFCC’s application in a suit marked FHC/LCS/1064/2020.

The agency had said it was investigating the Speaker for the alleged offences of conspiracy, diversion of funds, abuse of office and money laundering.

But Justice Oweibo, on August 16, 2023, heard the application to unfreeze the accounts in his chamber.

During the hearing, the EFCC was represented by Mr. Sulaiman I. Sulaiman, while Obasa was represented by Mr. Adeyinka Olumide-Fusika (SAN).

The EFCC lawyer told the court that the application to unfreeze the accounts was pursuant to Section 44(2)(K) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and Sections 26, 29 and 34 (1) of the EFCC (Establishment) Act, 2004, and under the court’s inherent jurisdiction.

Section 44 of the Constitution concerns constitutional rights to property.

Justice Oweibo held: “It is hereby ordered that an order is hereby granted to the respondent/applicant setting aside the ex-parte orders of this court made on the 15th day of September 2020 upon the ex-parte motion of the Applicant/ Respondent in relation the funds of the Respondent/Applicant domiciled in the accounts stated in the following schedule:

“ACCOUNT NAME, FINANCIAL ACCOUNT INSTITUTIONS, TYPE OF ACCOUNT, 1. Mudasiru Ajayi Obasa, Standard Chartered, (US Dollars) 0001852063 2. Mudasiru Ajayi Obasa, Standard Chartered (Current) 0001852056 3. Mudashiru Ajayi Obasa, Standard Chartered (Saving) 5002309624.

“Issued at Lagos, under the seal of this Honourable Court and by the hands of the Presiding Judge this 16th day of August 2023.”

Why do few recognise and talk about the irreparable damage that Tinubu’s emergence as Nigeria’s president and the impunity with which he formed a government void of integrity have done to the soul and moral bearings of this country? Tinubu is the most controversial president in Nigeria’s history, and his government is the most integrity-deficient. Why are those normal?

Take the man himself. For the first time in its history, Nigeria has a president whose name, age, early education, tertiary education, and ancestral roots are subjects of raging controversies; a president once entangled in a drug-trafficking case in America, who forfeited $460,000 to the US authority; a president whose source of stupendous wealth and the credibility of that source set tongues wagging.

Tinubu said he attended primary and secondary schools, but later said he didn’t. He blamed “needless errors” for discrepancies in his INEC form in 1999, and now blames an unnamed clerk of Chicago State University for “several errors” in his recently-issued certificate!

The president of Nigeria should never be associated with such a miasma of dubiety. Here’s another “hard question”. What’s the message to aspiring future leaders of Nigeria?

That they can make the wrong choices in life, live a less-than-honest life, and still become president provided they have deep pockets and can manipulate the system? No one who truly loves Nigeria can ignore the damaging precedent that Tinubu’s emergence as president set for the moral bearings of this country.