Giwa-Osagie the lawyer to PDP’s presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar, has been arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for money laundering.
EFCC picked up the lawyer on Monday night for allegedly laundering $2m. Giwa was reportedly fingered by a bureau de change operator who identified him as the owner of the money.
Punch reports that EFCC operatives are suspecting that the $2m might have been budgeted for vote-buying or to compromise electoral officials.
A source who spoke to Punch said, “We believe the money was earmarked for either campaign financing, vote-buying or to compromise electoral officials but investigations would show what the money was meant for, the sources and why it was routed outside regular banking channels.”
Tony Orilade, the acting spokesman for the EFCC, refused to comment on the case just after he promised to further investigate the issue.
A former deputy spokesman of the All Progressives Congress, Timi Frank, speaking on the arrest describes it as a mere witch-hunt by the APC.
Frank continued saying the arrest of Giwa-Osagie, coming just a few weeks after Tunde Ayeni, a former chairman of Skye Bank Plc (now Polaris Bank), was picked up and detained, shows APC was desperate to “starve the opposition of critical funding for its campaign.”
Frank said, “Magu cannot claim to be fighting corruption when the only people he finds to be allegedly engaged in fraudulent activities are key members of the opposition. This is a witch-hunt and highly selective.
“Today, the EFCC is clearly an arm of the APC; no thanks to Magu who has officially pledged his support to Buhari by wearing his re-election campaign brooch on his suit lapel.”
