The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has arranged a couple identified as Baba Sule Abubakar Sadiq and Hafsat Kabir Lawal, alongside two others, Abdullahi Bala and Ladani Akindele, before Justice Amina Bello of the Kaduna State High Court for allegedly obtaining money by false pretense, money laundering and stealing to the tune of N197,750,000.
They were arraigned on Monday, March 10, 2025 with six counts.
Specifically, the defendants allegedly colluded with each other and deceived their victims through different measures, including the wife of Katsina State Governor Fatima Dikko Radda.
Initially, the defendants were arrested by officials from the State Department of Services (DSS) and subsequently transferred to the EFCC, it was obvious that their crime was in essence financial crime.
One of the fees read
“That you Hafsat Kabir Lawal, Babasule Abubakar Sadiq, Abdullahi Bala, Ladani Akindele Ayodele sometimes in December 2024 at Kaduna within the jurisdiction of this honorable court with intent to defraud did obtain the sum of N89,000,000.00 Eighty Nine Million Naira Only from Aminu Usman which money you caused to be paid in to the Taj Bank plc account number 0009914725 belongs to Abdullahi Bala, in false disguise, that you have $53,300 for $53,300 for the Naira equivalent, you know you know it is false, so you have violated the offence of breach of prepaid fraud and other related fraud related expenses.
The defendant pleaded not guilty to the charge when reading to them.
In view of their request, prosecutors attorneys, Bright Ogbana (C.
The attorney of the first and second defendants, Ms. St. Ku; the attorney of the third defendant Jazuli Mustapha and the attorney of the fourth defendant Paul A. Okachi informed the court that they had filed and provided various applications for the client’s bail and were ready to proceed.
Ogbonna strongly opposed the bail application, citing that they were not mature. In response, all defense attorneys prayed that the court would allow the application for oral bail.
After hearing both parties’ submissions and arguments, Justice Bello agreed to prosecute, so he returned the defendant to the correctional facility and adjourned the matter until March 17, 2025 to hear the bail application.
In a statement released by the EFCC said the investigation indicated that Hafsat was one of the wives of current Kasina Governor Malam Dikko Radda. Using this guise, she allegedly obtained the sum of N89,000,000 from a replacement who claimed $118,300 to them.
Further investigation revealed that Hafsat’s husband Sadik (second defendant) provided his wife with two SIM cards and registered with Fatima Dikko Radda in TrueCaller. He then allegedly contacted the fourth defendant, Ladani Akindele, who was his former colleague and asked him to provide him with contacts from Hafiz Bashir, chairman of the Solidarity Bank, who got the contacts of his contacts, the petitioner who was a member of the committee committee.
Hafsat has since contacted the petitioner Aminu Usman and collected the sum of N197,750,000 from him, claiming that her money equals the money ($118,300).
The money is said to have been deposited into the bank account of the third defendant Abdullahi Bala, which was provided by the first defendant, who allegedly were allocated among the four defendants and were laundered by various means.
