US website, Daily Beast has linked the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu to a heroin ring.
The article, which was published on April 27, 2015, is titled “Nigeria’s Next Leader’s Ties to a Heroin Ring.”
In it, Tinubu is described as a former “bagman for two heroin traffickers” while his connection to President-elect, Muhammadu Buhari is also brought to the fore.
The article reads in part:
“General
Muhammed Buhari’s political partner is a former bagman for two heroin
traffickers. But that’s just business as usual in Nigeria.”
“Nigeria’s
election last month was celebrated as an unlikely victory for democracy
in an African country with a tenuous record of free and fair
representation.”
“But the man most responsible for midwifing General
Muhammed Buhari’s ballot triumph over current President Goodluck
Jonathan has a spotty CV. Former Lagos provincial governor Bola Tinubu,
affectionately nicknamed the Jagaban, is today seen as a shrewd if not
“deeply Machiavellian” Svengali in Nigeria’s politics as well as the
architect of a hugely successful anti-corruption platform.”
“But
20 years ago he had to forfeit nearly half a million dollars to the
U.S. Treasury Department after being named as an accomplice in a white
heroin-trafficking and money-laundering ring that stretched from West
Africa to the U.S. Midwest.”
“A recent gauzy Financial Times profile of him, for
instance, neglected to mention that two decades ago Tinubu was
identified as a bagman for two Nigerian heroin movers who operated out
of Chicago and Hammond, Indiana. They were Adegboyega Mueez Akande and
Abiodun Agbele, Akande’s nephew, who was exposed to law enforcement
after selling white heroin first to Lee Andrew Edwards, another dealer
later jailed for trying to murder a federal agent, and then to an
undercover cop.”
“In a 1993 court docket from the
U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Illinois, which The
Daily Beast obtained from Sahara Reporters, a Nigeria-focused news
outlet, IRS Special Agent Kevin Moss said that Akande had run the white
heroin ring in the late 1980s until 1990, when he handed off the U.S arm
of the business to his nephew, who had arrived in 1988.”
“Akande
then returned to Nigeria but continued to oversee the operation from
abroad with the help of others at home and in the United States,
including his relatives. One of the individuals identified in his cartel
by Moss was Tinubu, then a Chicago State University-educated accountant
working as a treasurer for Mobil Oil Nigeria Ltd, a subsidiary of
energy giant Mobil Oil, which was still a few years shy of its famous
merger with Exxon in 1999.”
“Tinubu gave differing
accounts for his wealth to Moss. In one phone call from Nigeria,
shortly after the U.S. Treasury seized his money, he admitted to wiring
$100,000 to Akande’s Houston bank account and to receiving the $80,000
from Akande into his First Heritage account. Tinubu also said that apart
from one other account in Fairfax, Virginia, he had no other money
stashed in U.S. banks.”
“Except that there were
other accounts. Citibank has a worldwide banking division known as
Citibank International where Tinubu stashed an additional $550,000. He
also controlled an entity called Compass Finance and Investments Company
Ltd., of which Akande and Agbele were directors.”
“There’s
no evidence that Tinubu was ever indicted for any crime. He eventually
settled with the district court, turning over $460,000 of the seized
$1.4 million, with the remainder released back to him. The Beast tried
repeatedly to contact Marsha McClellan, the U.S. attorney who prosecuted
the case, but was unsuccessful.”
The article further refers to a recent open letter written by Buruji Kashamu, a Nigerian politician also accused of drug dealing in the US, praising Tinubu and calling him his role model.
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