Forex Trader in Court for N29m Fraud, Gets N10m Bail

By Dipo Olowookere

Justice Usman Na’abba of the Kano State High Court has granted a Bureaux de Change (BDC) operator, Mr Umar Goni Abdulrahman, a N10 million bail with two reliable sureties in like sum.

This followed a motion for bail moved by the suspect’s counsel, Mr Adamu Kalandi, after his client pleaded “not guilty” to the one-count charge bordering on criminal breach of trust filed against him by the Kano Zonal Office of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on Tuesday, August 18, 2020.

The judge said one of the sureties should be an owner of a landed property within the jurisdiction of the court. The defendant and the sureties are to deposit two recent passport photographs with the registrar of the court. Also, the sureties’ addresses would be verified by the registrar of the court.

The EFCC brought the forex trader before Justice Na’abba today after a petitioner, one Mr Abdulrahman Ibrahim, alleged that sometime in December 2019, the defendant obtained the sum of N29.7 million from him under the guise of selling the dollar equivalent of the said amount to him.

It was further alleged that after the payment of the said money into the suspect’s bank account, he refused to give the petitioner the dollar equivalent of the money or returned the money to the petitioner.

”That you Umar Goni Abdulrahman, sometime in December, 2019 at Kano, within the judicial division of the High Court of Justice, Kano, being entrusted with the sum of N29,700,000 by Abdulrahman Ibrahim, which was transferred to your bank account No 3646288026, domiciled with FCMB for the purchase of United States of America dollar, fraudulently misappropriated same, in violation of the mode in which such trust is to be discharged and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 311 and punishable under Section 312 of the Penal Code,” the charge read.

After he pleaded ” not guilty” to the charge, the prosecution counsel, Mr Idris Haruna, applied for a date to open his case and also requested that the defendant be remanded at the Correctional Service.

After the bail conditions were announced the judge adjourned the case till September 22, 2020, for hearing.