The Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ola Olukoyede, says the agency has uncovered a religious sect laundering money for t+rrorists.
Olukoyede, who made the revelation at a one-day dialogue on “Youth, Religion, and the Fight against Corruption.” on Wednesday in Abuja, also said N7 billion fraud proceeds was traced to another religious organisation.
He further said the EFCC had found religious organisations, institutions, sects and bodies culpable of money laundering in the country. Olukoyede said one of such religious bodies dr+gged the commission to court to protect its leader after laundered money was traced to its bank account.
The EFCC boss said the religious body got a court injunction restraining the commission from inviting, arresting or prosecuting its leader. “We will not give up on recovering the stolen funds. It is so sad that as I stand before the eminent audience today, that our experience in fighting corruption has to do with the religious leaders and even traditional rulers.
As I stand before you there is a matter we are handling of over 30 billion fleeced from Nigeria, and we were able to trace N7 billion to a particular religious body.
As we wrote a letter to the leader, the next thing we saw was a restraining order, stopping us from inviting them, stopping us from recovering the money.”
He said that the EFCC had appealed the judgment. “Of course, we have appealed. Sometimes ago, we investigated the issue of money laundering, somewhere in this country, there is a particular religious sect that launders money for t+rrorists, these are the problems we are battling with,” Olukoyede added.
