The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on
Wednesday arraigned an Onitsha-based businessman Chris Onyebuchi Ijeoma alongside
his company, Tellers International Limited before Justice I.B.Gafai of the
Federal High Court, Awka, Anambra state on a two-count charge of obtaining
money under false pretense and stealing the sum of N10,000,000 (Ten Million
Naira Only) belonging to the head pastor and general overseer of a Pentecostal
church in the commercial city.
Ijeoma’s ordeal started after a petition was written to the
commission alleging that sometime in 2014, he approached the complainant
(General Overseer) with a business proposal to help raise funds to finance the
importation of insecticide/ pest sprayer from the USA, to the tune of N10m,
with a promise to pay back within three months, after the sale of the products.
The complainant further stated that having advanced the sum
to the suspect, who was also an elder of the church council, on March 18 ,
2014, he waited for more than after three months without receiving any payment
as promised.
He then approached Ijeoma and demanded to know why the
products were not yet imported, to which he said he had invested the money in a
US-based cream company and that NAFDAC approval was needed before the goods
would be exported to Nigeria; a development different from what was agreed
upon.
When the case was called, the suspect pleaded not guilty to
the charge.
Defence counsel, C.M. Obijagwam thereafter applied orally
for his client’s bail which was denied by Justice Gafai stating he had to apply
formally.
He further ordered that the suspect be remanded in prison
custody pending the hearing of the bail application.
The case has been adjourned to June 6 and 8, 2017.
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