The Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu has described Rivers States as the “the headquarter of money laundering”.
Magu stated this while informing of the EFCC’s intention to reopen the investigation of Rivers State’s former governor, Peter Odili.
According to Magu, the high rate of money laundering in Rivers is “because there is a lot of oil money.”
Odili had in 2007 been granted a court injunction preventing the EFCC from investigating or arresting him.
The court order also restrained the anti-graft agency from probing the finances of the Rivers state government.
Magu said the commission has appealed against the injunction, but that the appeal is still pending at the supreme court.
He said subsequent judgments of the courts have held that the EFCC cannot be restrained from investigating anyone.
Magu said Rivers has the second-highest number of money laundering cases after Lagos.
“I think Rivers is the next to Lagos in terms of crime. This is the headquarter of money laundering because there is a lot of oil money here,” Magu said.
“Nothing is going to stop us. Even the issue of the court order allegedly obtained by Dr Peter Odili and co to stop the EFCC from investigation and prosecution is still at the Supreme Court. We are on it.
“I am telling you that, that judgement cannot stand; it will only take some time but it cannot hold and we are going to conclude the investigation.
“There are so many investigations we are doing. I am sure the matter has suffered for about 13 years now. We are going to test it. The matter is in the Supreme Court. We will follow it up.
“That decision that is pending in the Supreme Court cannot hold water again. There is a subsequent judgment that has overridden it.
“Other judgments say nobody, not even a judge, not even the Judiciary, not even the court can stop us from investigating and prosecuting.”
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