Governor Fayose Sues EFCC And Zenith Bank Over Freezing Of His Accounts

Mr. Ayo Fayose, governor of Ekiti State in southern Nigeria, on Tuesday, June 28, 2016 filed a suit against the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and Zenith Bank Plc in a federal high court in Ado-Ekiti over the anti-graft order to the bank to freeze his personal bank accounts.

Subsequently, the court ordered the EFCC and Zenith Bank to appear before it on July 4, 2016 to show cause why it should not grant Fayose’s request that the freeze on his account be lifted. The governor had announced on Monday, June 20, 2016 that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has frozen his personal bank account in Zenith Bank.

“My personal account of at Zenith Bank has been frozen courtesy of Buhari led APC tyrannical government,” the governor wrote on micro-blogging website, Twitter. Fayose has been an outspoken critic of President Muhammadu Buhari and enjoys immunity from criminal  and civil prosecution as a governor.

The EFCC claimed that Fayose’s personal accounts were  used in receiving about N4.7 billion from the office of the national security advise. The anti-graft agency said its investigation traced the fund to part of that used to fund Fayose’s governorship elections of 2014.

Fayose insisted that his election campaign was funded mainly by Zenith Bank, and not the office of the NSA. The governor is being represented by a senior lawyer and prominent human rights activist, Mr. Mike Ozekhome (SAN).