…as Police lawyer accuses Kyari of swindling money, properties of dead kidnapper
. America stands akimbo for his extradition
Former suspended Deputy Commissioner of Police, Abba Kyari, more troublous times are here.
While he is currently being grilled by a special investigation panel set up by the Nigeria Police Force to ascertain his complicity in alleged criminal activities that warranted his extradition request from the United States, fresh home troubles have arisen for the embattled ‘super cop’.
Kyari has been accused by a lawyer attached to the Inspector General of Police Intelligence Response Team, Nosa Uhumwangho, of directing him to pay the proceed from a hotel owned by an alleged kidnap kingpin (who is now deceased), into personal accounts.
Uhamwangho made the fresh revelation on Wednesday, while appearing before the Nigerian Bar Association Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee.
He particularly alleged, through a statement, that Kyari instructed him to pay the sum of N3,075,300, which was a proceed from De-English Hotel, Enugu and another property at 21, Edinburgh Street, owned by the alleged kidnap kingpin, the late Collins Ezenwa, also known as E-Money, into his (Uhumwangho’s) bank.
Uhumwangho in a 131 paragraph affidavit dated June 20 2021, and submitted to the NBA’s LPDC, said Kyari instructed him to pay the proceeds into his Zenith Bank personal account as against the police account, “for obvious reasons”.
He further revealed that Kyari’s team directed a notorious cultist, Tochukwu Okeke, to collect rents from properties owned by the late Ezenwa, on his (Kyari’s) behalf.
Meanwhile, the Nigerian Army recently arrested and detained Okeke at the 82 Division of the military over his alleged sponsorship of members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
Okeke, who shunned summons from the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) panel investigating the activities of the defunct Special Anti-robbery Squad (SARS) of the Nigeria Police, had claimed that he paid $2 million ransom to the late Ezenwa’s gang after he was kidnapped in 2016.
A lawyer and human rights activist, Justice Ijeoma, had also dragged Uhumwangho before the NBA for “conducts unbecoming of a legal practitioner”.
Ijeoma in his petition alleged that Uhumwangho in concert with other police officers attached to the Inspector General of Police –Intelligence Response Team (IGP-IRT), criminally converted the properties of his client.
Uhumwangho, under cross-examination by Ijeoma’s lead counsel, Max Ogar, admitted paying the money into his personal account based on the directive of his boss, Abba Kyari.
In a letter dated 28 January 2019, Kyari wrote, “ The National Human Rights Commission of Nigeria (Presidential Panel on SARS Reforms) which sat in Abuja on 25th January, 2019, directed the Legal Officer of IGP-IRT to recover money in possession of any person controlling the aforesaid properties and make them render account.
“In view of the above-stated fact, you are hereby directed/ordered to recover any money therefrom and take possession and make sure it is properly kept and safe in your custody, because if paid into the Police account, it will be difficult to recover it and tender it before the court as the matter is still pending at the Honourable Federal High Court, Owerri Judicial Division. The court may make demand for it in the nearest future.”
“Thank you for your patriotic zeal in serving the Nigeria Police Force and your motherland to the best of your ability and capability. Accept the assurance of my high esteem regard.”
NHRC panel, however, denied authorising Kyari to collect any money on late Ezenwa’s property and pay into a private account.
Amnesty International and National Human Rights Commission in 2018 also accused Kyari of illegally depleting the assets of Collins Ezenwa who was illegally executed by theSARS in Owerri, Imo State.
Collins Ezenwa’s widow further told the NHRC panel that Kyari and his team withdrew money from her late husband’s bank account, seized his cars for their private use and collected millions of proceeds from his hotels and properties.
The Nigerian Human Rights Commission also disclosed in an October 2018 petition to the then Inspector-General, Ibrahim Idris, that the IRT, led by Kyari, had depleted the asset of Collins Ezenwa, the suspected kidnapper who was gunned down in January 2018.
Kyari had said Ezenwa was a notorious kidnapper who had committed untold atrocities before he was killed.
The police in Imo State accused Ezenwa, a former police corporal, of leading a syndicate of deadly abductors. He was killed during an exchange of gunfire along the Enugu-Owerri Expressway.
Kyari and his team members were said to have taken over Ezenwa’s properties worth billions of naira.
A hotel linked to Ezenwa in Enugu was estimated at N220,000,000. He also had two duplexes and eight blocks of flats worth a combined N180 million, according to the NHRC petition.
The victim, who was a police corporal before he resigned, also had a fleet of exotic vehicles. Other properties of Ezenwa have also been identified in Imo and Abia states, estimating his worth in billions.
All these damning revelations are coming after Kyari earned suspension and widespread condemnations, as a court sitting in the United States ordered his arrest and prosecution, which forced the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to demand his extradition.
Otis Wright, a judge of the United States District Court for the Central District of California had ordered the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to track Kyari down for participating in a multi-million dollar fraud.
Kyari allegedly played a major role in a multi-million dollar fraud perpetrated by Ramon Abbas, aka Hushpuppi, and his co-conspirators.
The Attorney’s Office had alleged that Ramon Abbas, aka Hushpuppi, paid Kyari up to $1.1 million to arrest and jail a certain Chibuzo Vincent.
Though an embattled Kyari denied the allegations, the Nigeria Police placed him on indefinite suspension and instituted a probe panel to try him.
However, the FBI had since written the police authorities in Nigeria that time was ticking, in respect of Kyari’s extradition, for trial.