Until the Nigerian Central Bank’s recent release of the shocking financial state of five major Nigerian banks, Mrs. Cecilia Ibru, who presided with the imperiousness of a queen over the affairs of Oceanic Bank, had lived a carefully constructed but false life. Cocooned in her shaky edifice, she set herself up as a role model. She garnered numerous spurious awards, quite a few of them bestowed by Thisday newspaper whose publisher, Nduka Obaigbena, has made a career out of handing bogus awards to the likes of Mrs. Ibru and tottering institutions like her bank.
Mrs. Ibru’s castle-in-the-sand came crumbling over the last two weeks as the Nigerian public as well as the international community got sneak views of her shady dealings in Oceanic Bank, and elsewhere.
The depths of Mrs. Ibru’s fraudulent banking activities are most shockingly revealed in her dealings with two hitherto unknown characters who were last week declared wanted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. The two fugitives being sought by the EFCC are Mr. Dele Kelvin Oye, a shadowy Abuja-based lawyer, and Mrs. Nana Bedell, a former house staff of Mrs. Ibru known as her kids’ former nanny. Mrs. Bedell, who fronted for Mrs. Ibru in extensive money laundering activities, masked herself with several aliases, including Nana Abdullahi, Nana Shetu Bedell, Nana Shetu Priscilia Bedell, Priscilia N. Abdullahi and Nana Udenwa.
Mr. Oye, who hails from Edo State, has ties to the Sani Abacha regime, Governor Gabriel Suswan of Benue State, former Governor James Ibori as well as to Yar'adua's Minister of Labour and Productivity, Prince Adetokunbo Kayode (SAN). He holds a number of titles and positions, among them the President of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ife Alumni Association and President of the Abuja Chamber of Commerce and Industry. A “knight” who is visible in an Abuja Cathedral, Mr. Oye has also served since 2001 as coordinator of the prosecuting team of the Nigerian Bar Association (Legal Practitioners’ Disciplinary Committee).
A source from within Oceanic Bank told Saharareporters that Mr. Oye had “close personal relationship with Mrs. Ibru.” Mrs. Ibru put him on the board of Oceanic Pension Fund Custodians Ltd. Last week it was revelaed by the EFCC that Oye is the main front for the Mrs. Ibru's money laundering scams. His colleagues at his Abuja-based law firm , Dele Oye and Associates, were shocked to find their names on the board of the firm that owed billion of naira in toxic loans to Oceanic bank last week.
Investigations by Saharareporters also revealed that Mr. Oye is embedded – through business deals – with Mrs. Yemisi Suswan, the wife of Governor Suswan of Benue State. Oye sits on the board of a company, All-purpose Shelters Limited, as company secretary/legal adviser. Mrs. Suswan is CEO of Allpurpose Shelters company according to CAC records.
Mr. Oye’s business ties to the Suswans have raised suspicions that the EFCC chair, Mrs. Farida Waziri,let him escape. Mrs. Waziri is known to be extremely close to Governor Suswan and his wife.
Investigations by Saharareporters revealed that Oye, who appears to have fled Nigeria, is a tested and veteran player in the highly secretive world of money laundering in Nigeria. Our correspondents gathered that Oye featured prominently in the money laundering activities of the late General Sani Abacha’s regime. A source in Nigeria’s intelligence sector told our correspondent that Oye was the main link between General Jerry Useni, one of Abacha’s closest confidants who also served as minister in charge of the Federal Capital Territory, and the several fronts used by Mr. Useni to steal and siphon funds. One of our sources stated that Oye appeared to have met Mrs. Ibru while serving to facilitate some illicit deals for the former FCT minister.
Mr. Oye’s work as prosecutor for the body of benchers has come under scrutiny following disclosure of his connections with the Ibrus as well as former Governor Ibori.
In April of 2008, Oye “successfully” prosecuted two lawyers and recommended that the Supreme Court remove their names from the roll of lawyers. Justice Akintola Ejiwunmi had dragged the two lawyers, Moses Odiri and Andrew Oru, before the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee (LPDC) after they accused former Chief Justice Muhammadu Uwais of collecting a bribe from Mr. Ibori to help the former governor “kill” a case to show that he was an ex-convict. Oddiri is known to have accused Ibori of participating in the assassination of NADECO financier, Pa Alfred Rewane.
A prominent Abuja-based lawyer told Saharareporters that the case to disbar the two lawyers, which was decided by Justices Kulu Aliyu and Umaru Eri, “smelled fishy to me.”
In a petition by Andrew Oru to current Chief Justice Idris Legbo Kutigi, what emerges is that Mr. Bayo Ojo, then president of the Nigerian Bar Association who later served as President Olusegun Obasanjo’s attorney general, championed the petition against the two disrobed lawyers.
Saharareporters has confirmed that the petition was actually authored in 2005 by Lanre Ipinmisho, Mr. Ojo’s special assistant. Shortly after the petition was submitted to the LPDC, Ibori’s attorney general and current deputy governor of Delta State, Professor Agbo Utuama, paid N2 million into Mr. Bayo Ojo from Utuama's Prime chambers account at Zenith Bank.
Presented with these facts, a prominent Lagos-based lawyer said he saw “a clear appearance of impropriety and perhaps abuse of office by Mr. Oye – whom I used to hold in high regard – as well as other players in this questionable drama.”
A source close to the embattled Mrs. Ibru told Saharareporters that he was aware that the former Oceanic Bank CEO stepped up to bankroll the prosecution of the lawyers on behalf of Ibori and former Chief Justice Uwais. Mr. Oye, a very close friend of Uwais’s and who has held sway at the LPDC since 2001, saw to it that the disciplinary body eventually took the two lawyers’ licenses away.
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