President of the Senate of Nigeria, Senator Bukola Saraki’s messy secrets has been revealed. Mr. Amazi Nwachuckwu, Head of Funds Transfer Unit of the Guaranty Trust Bank made the revelations recently: “Dr. Saraki filled the transfer request form in Kwara State Government House, Ilorin.”
“He gave the instruction to transfer the sum of $73,223.28 to the beneficiary, the America Express Services Europe Limited, New York, through the America Express Bank, New York’s account number 730580 maintained by America Express Service Europe Limited.”
“The purpose of the payment was funding for amounts utilised on AMEX (American Express) cards issued to the customer (dollar credit card no. 374588216836009). For his dollar account number 441/441953/2/1/0, the customer (Saraki) signed the fund transfer form. The form was received from the account officer in Ilorin branch.”
“We then processed it and transferred it to our corresponding bank abroad. The corresponding bank then transferred it to America Express Bank Limited. Exhibit 7 is a letter dated February 10, 2010. It is a letter of offer of facility. From the letter, the borrower was Dr. Bukola Saraki. The sum of N375m was offered to him. The purpose of the offer was for the purchase of the property in London. From Exhibit 9 (bank statement), there was part-payment of mortgage redemption.”
“On February 15, 2010, there was second part-payment for mortgage redemption. (The amount remaining to be paid was £1,394, 415.53). On February 16, 2010, there was full and final payment for mortgage redemption. Total amount payment was £1,516,194.53. The transfers were done within two days on February 15 and 16, 2010.”
“I did not have the full knowledge of the procedure of fund transfer in London, but going by perspective derived from my experience with GTB; for a customer to give instruction to transfer money to another account in another bank, that customer must be maintaining an account in that another bank.”
“A telex was usually generated and sent to the customer who gave the transfer instruction as confirmation for the transfer of funds to foreign accounts. The “telexes” with respect to Saraki’s pounds sterling transfer were burnt in a fire incident that engulfed the Funds Transfer Unit at the GTB headquarters.”
“As I explained, when you debit a customer, he receives debit alert. When the transaction is consummated by transfer of the money abroad, a telex confirmation is generated and sent to the account officer who will now forward it to the customer. The three telexes with respect to the Saraki’s transactions) were destroyed by fire incident that happened in the unit. I’m not aware of any complaint that the (Saraki’s) London account did not receive the money.”