The embattled Managing Director
of Ibadan-based Citadel Oracle Concepts, Mr. Benjamin Joseph is not done yet
with his alleged mischief, as he reportedly petitioned the Vice President,
Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, for a second time record, reports ITRealms.
Information reaching our
newsroom, showed that Joseph, has again petitioned Vice President, Osinbajo
against the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC); the Nigerian
Police and the Attorney General of the Federation over his on-going prosecution
for false petitioning and deceit by the Police.
ITRealms recalls that Joseph also
accused of allegedly blackmailing officials of Zinox Technologies Ltd, over a
N170 million contract for the supply of HP laptops awarded to the Federal
Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).
His prosecution by the Nigerian
Police, ITRealms reports, is before an Abuja High Court, which arose after
rigorous investigations following his petition five years and precisely 2013, regarding
a business transaction with his authorized representative, Princess Kama and
ICT products distributors, Technology Distributions Ltd (TD).
ITRealms also gathered that Mr. Joseph
had previously petitioned Osinbajo, alleging that his company was used to
defraud the Federal Government of over N200m over the non-supply of the said
laptops, had recently sent another written petition to the Vice President
against the security agencies and the Attorney General’s office.
Further, ITRealms gathered that
upon receipt of the first petition, the Vice President had immediately escalated
it to the appropriate authority – the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
(EFCC) for due investigation, which led to the visit by the Procurement Fraud
Unit of the EFCC to the offices of the FIRS and found every unit of the HP
laptops supplied with serial numbers nationwide and each unit traced to its
respective user.
Further investigations showed the
existence of a copy of a Letter of Authority which Joseph issued to the FIRS,
with copies of his international passport, accepting the award of the contract
for the supply of the HP laptops and appointing his associate, Princess Kama as
his authorized representative to handle the transaction.
In addition to the office of the
Vice President, Joseph had also petitioned the EFCC, Lagos who investigated and
saw no merit in his complaint, especially alleging forgery of his signature on
the board resolution to open an account at Access Bank, which investigation
proved otherwise, with a forensic analysis confirming that the Board resolution
documents were not forged but were actually signed by him, alongside other
false claims, leading to the former Inspector General of Police, Solomon Arase,
arraigning him for deceit and false petitioning at an Abuja court under Charge
Number CR/216/16 at the FCT High Court.
Echika Ezuka, Corporate
Communications Advisor to Zinox, disclosed that he is constrained to speak
about Benjamin’s case as it is still pending before an Abuja High Court, noting
that Zinox had also slammed a N2BN defamation suit on Premium Times which the
defendant had been using for his campaign of blackmail.
According to Ezuka, Premium Times
is yet to file its defense on the defamation case over two months since it was
instituted.
“The on-going case for which
Joseph is currently being prosecuted is between Citadel Oracle Concepts and
another company which our Chairman has shares in. That company is Technology
Distributions (TD), the biggest ICT products distributor in Sub-Saharan African
representing major IT brands like HP, Lenovo, Dell, Microsoft and many others.
TD is a totally different company from Zinox with different directors,
shareholders, management team and a different line of business and Zinox was
not in any way involved in the transaction,” he explained.
Chuks Egbune/GEE
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