Freezing of Account: Fayose wants S/Court to upturn A/Court Judgment

Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State has headed to the Supreme Court, seeking to upturn the judgment of the Appeal Court in Ado Ekiti on Thursday, permitting the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to freeze his personal accounts.

He has also filed a stay of execution of the judgment of the appeal court pending the determination of the case.

The accounts were in June 2016 frozen by the EFCC after they were allegedly linked to the $2.2billion arms deal fraud which occurred at the office of National Security Adviser under the erstwhile government of Goodluck Jonathan.

But the Federal High Court in Ado-Ekiti under the leadership of Taiwo – Taiwo, unblocked the accounts after faulting the steps taken by the commission in barring Mr. Fayose access to the accounts.

Thursday’s Appeal Court judgment, granted the prayers of the EFCC, and over-ruled the judgment of the Federal High Court.

The judge said although Mr. Fayose enjoys constitutional immunity, his accounts, found to be linked to the proceeds of crime, were not covered by the said immunity.

Speaking to an Online Medium on Saturday, Counsel to Mr. Fayose, Chief Mike Ozekhome SAN, said his client had appealed the judgment at the Supreme Court.

“We have already appealed the Judgment at the Supreme Court on Friday,” Ozekhome said, confirming that a motion for a stay of execution had also been filed.

“The entire Judgment of the Court of Appeal was perverse and did not take the facts and the law into consideration,” he said.

“In fact, the Judgment was against an earlier ruling of the same Court of Appeal two days ago, when the EFCC wanted to adduce further evidence on the matter”, Ozekhome added.

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