Some senior officials of the ministry of justice have
been quizzed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over
suspicion of corruption in the compilation of presidential pardon list.
President Muhammadu Buhari controversially pardoned Joshua
Dariye and Jolly Nyame, two former governors currently serving jail terms for
corruption, after getting the nod of the Council of State on April 15.
The council is made up of the president, vice-president,
former heads of state, former chief justices, senate president, speaker,
governors and the attorney-general of the federation (AGF).
Based on the recommendation of the presidential prerogative of mercy committee, Buhari submitted names of 162 persons to the council for advice.
All — except Francis Atuche, former managing director of
Bank PHB, and two others — were approved.
There has been widespread criticism of the pardon and the
full list of those pardoned is still being kept under wraps, although it was
learnt that many convicted coup plotters made it.
Dariye and Nyame are yet to be released from prison weeks
after the pardon, reportedly because of bureaucratic bottlenecks.
TheCable quoting sources at the ministry of justice reports that
several aides of Abubakar Malami, the AGF, who were responsible for the
processing of the list are currently being investigated by the anti-graft
agency.
“Of particular surprise is the inclusion of Atuche on the
list that was submitted to the Council of State,” an official of the ministry disclosed.
“There are several names that raised suspicion and the EFCC
had to be called in to investigate what went down.”
Atuche (pictured) was, in June 2021, convicted of N25.7 billion fraud
and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment to run concurrently for six years.
When the name was presented to the council, it was rejected,
supposedly because he had just been convicted and was yet to serve one full
year.
Dariye and Nyame were both jailed in 2018.
“Mrs Leticia Ayoola-Daniels, director of the administration
of criminal justice and reforms department under the justice ministry, is also
being quizzed by the EFCC,” the source said.
TheCable also reports that those invited have been subjected
to lie detector tests “and many of them are failing”.
Some of those quizzed attributed their failure to pass the
test to “high blood pressure”, the source disclosed.
There is yet no scientific proof linking blood pressure to
effectiveness of lie detector test.
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