The EFCC charges a businessman

A businessman named Bernard Okechukwu Nzenwa and his company, Omega Maritime and Energy Limited, were both charged by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) yesterday in Ikeja, Lagos. Nzenwa was charged with issuing false documents and was arraigned before Justice Rahmon Oshodi.

Nzenwa, Omega Maritime and Energy Limited, and Dr. Oluchi Nzenwa (Now at Large), according to the anti-graft agency, issued phony documents claiming to be from Guaranty Trust Bank Plc.

The defendants allegedly issued a false document on March 9, 2011, titled “Bond for the re-exportation of imported goods,” delivered without payment of import duty, which they claimed to have come from Guaranty Trust Bank Plc, according to the EFCC counsel, Mr. G.C. Akaogu.

Their offenses violated Section 360(1)(b) and were thus punished under Section 364(1) of the Lagos State Criminal Law of 2011. Nzenwa, the defendant who also served as the company’s answering service, entered a not guilty plea.

After the defendant entered a plea, the prosecuting attorney, Akaogu, requested that the suspect be held in custody while the lawsuit was being heard.

However, in his oral application, Mr. Clinton Eaezie, the defendant’s attorney, pleaded with the court to release his client on bail. He informed the court that the defendant was not at risk of fleeing because he had been granted administrative bail at the EFCC’s office.

In response, the court denied the defendant’s request for bail based on an oral hearing.