The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has launched a manhunt for an associate of Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State, Abiodun Agbele.
Agbele allegedly received N1.2 billion from Obanikoro on behalf of Fayose.
The money was said to have been flown to the Akure Airport and then conveyed to Zenith Bank.
According to five Zenith Bank deposit slips shown by the anti-graft agency, Agbele made deposits of over N900 million into his personal accounts and that of Fayose.
On June 26, 2014, Agbele made a deposit of N137m into a Zenith Bank account with account number 1003126654 belonging to Ayodele Fayose with teller number 0556814.
On June 17, 2014, Agbele also made a deposit of N100m into account number 1010170969 belonging to Spotless Investment Limited, a company owned by Fayose and his wife, Feyisetan.
On June 18, 2014, Agbele made another deposit of N219,490,000 into the account of De Privateer Limited with account number 1013835889. The company allegedly belongs to Agbele. On June 19, 2014, he also made a deposit of N300m into the same account while a third deposit of N200m was made into the same account on June 23, 2014.
The EFCC said, “Agbele is an associate of Fayose. We are currently looking for him because he has a lot of explanations to make. He held some of the money in trust for Fayose.”
In his reaction, Fayose admitted that Agbele was a trusted friend who paid money into his account. He, however, maintained that the money came from the management of Zenith Bank and private donations.
“The management of Zenith Bank, which mainly funded my election, called me to a meeting where I was assured that the fund would be provided for my election. I was asked to nominate a trusted ally to be related with and I nominated Mr. Abiodun Agbele.
“All the payments into Abiodun Agbele’s account domiciled in Zenith Bank were directly from Zenith Bank. In actual fact, the account was opened by Zenith Bank hurriedly at that time and Abiodun Agbele’s identity card, which ought to have been collected before the account was opened, was only collected last week in the bank’s desperation to perfect the account obviously after submitting to the intimidation and harassment of the EFCC.
“Most of the funds posted into Agbele’s account were through the Ibadan, Akure and Lagos branches of the Zenith Bank and, sometimes, they brought cash.”
Agbele’s account with Zenith Bank has since been frozen by the EFCC as well as those of Fayose and his company.
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