Dame Jonathan claims $31.4m found by EFCC is legal cash she set aside for medical bills

FORMER first lady Dame Patience Jonathan has defended having $31.4m in her bank account saying that the money was legitimately earned and was cash she set aside to cover her medical bills.

 

Last week, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) froze Dame Jonathan's Skye Bank account after it emerged that large sums of money had been deposited in it. In response, Dame Jonathan has now written to the acting chairman of the EFCC Ibrahim Magu, saying the cash was for the payment of the medical bills she incurred in London in 2013.

 

With the discovery of the most recent amount in the former first lady’s Skye Bank account, the total the EFCC has traced to her so far adds up to $20m. In addition, the EFCC has also traced four company accounts to Waripamowei Dudafa, Dr Goodluck Jonathan's special adviser on domestic affairs, with a balance of $15m, who is believed to have been laundering money for her.

 

Dame Jonathan claimed ownership of the $31.4m in an affidavit submitted before a Federal High Court in Lagos. In the affidavit, she admitted that Mr Dudafa helped her open the four bank accounts which the recently EFCC froze.

 

This led to the EFCC filing an amended 17-count against Mr Dudafa and seven others, including the four companies, with the defendants being accused of conspiring to conceal the monies which the EFCC claimed they ought to have known formed parts of the proceeds of an unlawful act. In her letter to Mr Magu by her lawyers, Granville Abibo and Co, Dame Jonathan enjoined the EFCC and Skye Bank to lift the restriction placed on the accounts.

 

She added that she has been using the account to pay for her medical bill and other personal purposes and that she is a law-abiding citizen. Her lawyers disputed claims that the monies were obtained through fraudulent means.

 

“It is noteworthy to emphasise that the said accounts, which were in US dollar denomination, were card-based accounts and our client is the sole signatory to these accounts. Our client has been operating the said accounts using the cards for her medical bill payments and purchases for her private purposes without any let or hindrance.

 

“Our client was therefore surprised when the said cards stop functioning on July 7, 2016, or thereabout. Our client immediately, thereupon, contacted Skye Bank Plc through our solicitors. Despite the foregoing, our client, who is a law-abiding citizen, has watched with surprise how efforts are being made surreptitiously to indirectly harass or harangue her and short-change her of her personal funds in breach of her fundamental human rights," Granville Abibo and Co wrote.

 

According to Dame Jonathan, in 2013 she underwent seven surgery operations within one month and the doctors had given up hope on her survival. She added that the money was set aside to cover these medical bills.