On November 4, the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) arrested the former governor of Delta State, Ifeanyi Okowa, for allegedly diverting ₦1.3 trillion derivation funds meant for his state’s development.
His arrest has had Nigerians wondering if he’ll face the wrath of the law, or if, like some others before him, he finds a way to get away with these charges or if his case simply gets forgotten over time.
This took us down the long memory lane of corruption cases against Nigerian governors with similar inconclusive endings.
Murtala Nyako, former governor of Adamawa state
On July 19, 2021, an Abuja federal high court told Murtala Nyako and his son that they had some explaining to do over a ₦29 billion fraud case filed against them by the EFCC. The father-son duo were slammed with a 37 count charge—everything from criminal conspiracy and stealing to abuse of office and money laundering. The case was later adjourned till January 2022, but it hit a roadblock after the judge in charge became temporarily unavailable.
In March 2024, the court case resumed. Nyako, along with his son, pleaded not guilty, and the judge adjourned the case to October 24 and October 28. If the case was revisited, then Google’s search engine should be questioned because nothing suggests it was.
Sule Lamido, former governor of Jigawa state
Lamido and Murtala Nyako might not be besties, but they definitely belong to the same “present-fathers” Whatsapp group. In 2015, the EFCC charged Lamido and his two sons, Aminu and Mustapha with 37 money laundering charges of ₦1.35 billion. In July 2023, after eight years of back-and-forth without results, the Abuja Court of Appeal dismissed the case because, according to them, the federal high court should have held the trial in Jigawa, where the alleged crime was committed instead of Abuja.
But the EFCC wasn’t about to let it go so easily. In August 2023, they asked the Supreme Court to revive the case and overrule the court of appeal’s decision because it didn’t make sense to them that the case was completely dismissed when it could have been easily transferred to Jigawa. The court didn’t overrule that decision, and the case remains dismissed to this day. If you’re wondering what Sule Lamido has been up to since then, he’s been granting interviews and being referred to as a “seasoned politician.”
Ayo Fayose, former governor of Ekiti state
This name probably rings a bell because the EFCC has had its sights set on Fayose and his aide, Abiodun Agbele since 2014 for a ₦6.9 billion fraud and money laundering case. Among many other things that, Fayose and his sidekick did with the money, they reportedly used ₦1.2 billion of it to fund his gubernatorial campaign in Ekiti.
The case never made it to court till 2018. He pleaded not guilty and got a ₦50 million bail on October 24, 2018. In December 2021, he was re-arraigned after the EFCC filed a petition against the court’s ruling. The back and forth continued for 3 years until March 2024 when the judge ordered the presentation of witnesses. in June 2024, Fayose’s lawyers argued that the EFCC hadn’t provided enough evidence to continue the case and, therefore, had no case against the ex-governor. They presented a no-case submission (a plea to dismiss the case) that was approved by Judge Nnamdi Dimgba from the federal high court in Abuja. EFCC appealed the court’s ruling, but there isn’t much information on what happened after.
Yahaya Bello, former governor of Kogi state
Yahaya Bello went from receiving praise for making history as Nigeria’s youngest governor to becoming the EFCC’s regular customer. In May 2024, the EFCC chairman accused Bello of transferring $720,000 from Kogi State funds to a Bureau De Change to cover the children’s school fees in advance before he left office. Instead of cooperating with EFCC’s investigations, Bello avoided the EFCC like a plague and resisted arrest
In September, Bello got tired of hiding and decided to finally honour the EFCC’s investigation to “clear his name”, but the name-clearing part didn’t happen because the EFCC brought 16 new charges against Bello, accusing him of misusing ₦110.4 billion in state funds to buy fancy properties in Abuja and Dubai and transferring a large part of the funds to a U.S. bank. As if those allegations are not wild enough, he was still accused of unlawfully obtaining ₦677 million from a business deal.
After the fresh allegations were brought up, Bello went back to avoiding the EFCC, but a court recently ruled that his trial should start even if he doesn’t appear in court. We still don’t know how the Yahaya Bello story will end, but it’s beginning to look like it might stretch on for years because the case has now been adjourned until January 2025. Yahaya Bello’s history of resisting arrest and acting unbothered suggests that we shouldn’t hold our breath for any consequence.
Danjuma Goje, former governor of Gombe state
In October 2011, Danjuma Goje and four other members of his administration were accused of moving ₦25 billion from the state treasury, but the case kept dragging on. In May 2012, while the case was being heard, members of the Gombe State Students Association protested outside the court demanding that Goje face justice without delay. But that never happened.
Goje and the EFCC had a long back and forth which lasted for eight years until June 2019, when things took a surprising turn: just 24 hours after Goje met with President Muhammadu Buhari and agreed to step down from his race for Senate President in favour of Ahmed Lawan, the EFCC handed the case over to the Attorney-General’s office, saying they hadn’t completely abandoned it but were simply transferring it.
Things worked in Goje’s favour again in July 2019 when the Attorney-General’s office requested to drop the last two charges against him. The court approved this request, and Goje walked away a free man.
Orji Uzor Kalu, former Governor of Abia state
In 2007, the EFCC charged Orji Uzor Kalu and his finance director, Jones Udeogu to court for misappropriating ₦7.65 billion in state funds. For 11 years, Kalu and his finance director didn’t face any real consequence until 2019, when he got a 12-year prison sentence and Udeogu a 10-year sentence.
But they barely spent one year in prison because, in 2020, Kalu and Udeogu were released after they argued that the verdict against them was invalid because the judge who gave it had already been promoted to the Court of Appeal when he handed it down.
The Federal High Court blocked the EFCC from restarting the trial, but they appealed the court’s decision in March 2024. The commission lost again after the Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal over missing documentation—a classic case of Nigeria’s “missing file” issues. The EFCC now says it’s fixing its paperwork system and will continue from where it stopped. Kalu is still a free man and a senator in the National Assembly.
The cases referenced in this article are few in a long list of politicians whose corruption cases never saw a conclusive end, either because they never went to court, they went to court and were dismissed after many years of back-and-forth, or they died while the cases were still ongoing.
Why do some corruption cases fade away?
- There are loopholes in the judicial system, and politicians take advantage of them
- Nigeria’s judicial system is inefficient, and this sometimes leads to delays.
- The EFCC is under-resourced.
- Interference from the executive arm of the government
- Overall system corruption
