Money lundering: Why Appeal court upheld Faisal Maina’s conviction

The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja has upheld the conviction of Faisal Maina, son of the jailed ex-Chairman of the defunct Pension Reform Taskforce Team (PRTT), Abdulrasheed Maina, who was prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC on a three count charge of conspiracy and money laundering.

The three-member panel of the appellate court, in a unanimous judgment on Thursday, November 24, 2022, ruled that Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court, Abuja was right to have convicted Faisal.

The Court held that the EFCC successfully established that Faisal, operated a fictitious bank account with the United Bank for Africa, UBA, through which his father, Maina, laundered the sum of N58.1million.

The appellate court noted that the said fund which was deposited into the account that was operated in the name of Alhaji Faisal Farm 2, was sequentially withdrawn by Faisal and his father between October 2013 and June 2019.

Justice Abang who in October 2021, found Faisal guilty on a three-count money laundering charge had said he was satisfied that the EFCC proved all the essential ingredients of the charge, stressing that the edfendant reasonably ought to have known that inflows into the bank account formed proceeds of an unlawful act of corruption by his father. The court ordered that the company through which the fund was laundered, Alhaji Faisal Farm 2, be wound up, with funds in it forfeited to the government.