How Nenadi Usman, the caretaker chair of the New Labour Party, returned N140 million and two houses during the Buhari administration’s corruption probe

Usman, a former minister of finance who served as the National Assembly’s representative for Kaduna South senatorial district from 2011 to 2015, was named the LP CTC Chair on Wednesday after an extended stakeholders’ meeting in Umuahia, the capital of Abia State.

The 29-member Labour Party Caretaker Committee will be led by former Finance Minister Senator Nenadi Usman, who repaid N140 million and turned over two mansions to the federal government due to accusations of fraud.

The 29-member committee’s secretary will be Senator Darlington Nwokocha of Abia Central, the most recent Senate Minority Deputy Leader. The committee has 90 days to do its work.

In order to bring a new party leadership from the Ward to the national arena, the Caretaker Committee is tasked with organising a convention and rescuing the party from its current leadership crisis.

According to SaharaReporters’ investigations, the former minister is presently facing charges of financial fraud in a number of different courts.

She was charged by the Federal Government in 2016 with N4.9 billion in fraud before Judge Rilwan Aikawa.

She is being prosecuted on 17 counts of stealing and money laundering, together with Femi Fani-Kayode, the former minister of aviation, Danjuma Yusuf, and Joint Trust Dimensions Limited.

The former Minister of Aviation, Nenadi Usman, Fani-Kayode, Yusuf Danjuma, the former National Chairman of the Association of Local Government of Nigeria (ALGON), and Joint-Trust Dimensions Nigeria Limited were re-arrested on January 24, 2022, by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on a 17-count charge pertaining to conspiracy and unlawful retention of N1.5 billion before Justice Daniel Osiagor of the Federal High Court located in Ikoyi, Lagos.

“That on or about the 8th day of January, 2015, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court in Lagos, you, Nnenadi Esther Usman, Femi Fani-Kayode, Danjuma Yusuf, and Jointrust Dimensions Nigeria Ltd. conspired among yourselves to indirectly retain the sum of N1,500, 000,000.00 (One Billion, Five Hundred Million Naira), which sum you reasonably ought to have known forms part of the proceeds of an unlawful act, namely: stealing, and you thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 18(a) of the Money Laundering (Prohibition)(Amendment) Act, 2012 and punishable under Section 15(3) & 4 of the same Act.” The accused entered a “not guilty” plea to the 17 counts.

Rotimi Oyedepo, the prosecution’s attorney, urged the court to set a trial date in light of the pleas. Later, the trial date was moved to March 17, 2022.

Additionally, prior to the 2015 presidential elections, it was stated that Senator Usman had returned N140 million of the N2.5 billion purportedly taken from the previous National Security Adviser’s office.

In exchange for being freed from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission’s (EFCC) detention, the former senator, who worked as the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) Presidential Campaign Organization’s Director of Finance, also turned over two of her residences to the federal government.

The article claims that she was detained in relation to multiple payments made into her account, including the N2.5 billion that was moved from the Central Bank of Nigeria, or CBN, into her account.

Furthermore, in January 2015, N140 million in cash was purportedly deposited into her Zenith Bank account.