Obanikoro has been in EFCC custody since on Monday October 17th for his alleged role in the misappropriation of $2.1 billion arms procurement fund. Embattled former Minister of State for Defence, Musiliu Obanikoro, has told EFCC officials that he gave Ekiti state governor, Ayo Fayose, the $5.37 million (N2.23 billion) he collected from former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki.
The Nation reports that the said amount was wired to Sylva Mcnamara, which has been linked to Obanikoro and his sons. Obanikoro during his interrogation, allegedly claimed to have transferred the money to Fayose for disbursement. According to him, he handed Fayose $5,377,000 in cash and N1.3billion was received by the governor’s associate, Abiodun Agbele.
During their interrogation, EFCC officials confronted Obanikoro with a petition from the Office of the National Security Adviser titled “Payment to companies with no contract awards or approval” and dated November 28th 2015. Obanikoro said having gone through the petition, he discovered that Sylva Mcnamara was No. 78 on the list of firms being investigated, having “collected the aggregate sum of N4,685,000,000 between April 4, 2014 and November 13, 2014.
An EFCC official who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the money when receivced was trasferred immediately to Fayose.
“In addition, the sum of N60million was converted to dollars at the rate of N168 per dollar and altogether the sum of $5,377,000 was handed over in cash by me to Mr. Fayose while the N1.3billion was received by Mr. Fayose’s associate, Mr. Abiodun Agbele, in the presence of my Aide-de-Camp (ADC), Lt. Adewale, who also accompanied them to the bank along with the bank officials.
N2.2billion was transferred to Sylva Mcnamara for onward transfer to Mr. Ayodele Fayose on the instruction of the National Security Adviser (NSA). The sum of N1.3billion cash was brought in a bullion van by Diamond Bank on the instruction of the NSA. I didn’t interact with the bank officials. I called Fayose before the funds were handed over to Mr. Abiodun Agbele. I spoke to Fayose with my phone at Akure airport.”