The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has apologised to Nicholas Ashinze over its misleading information on alleged funds misappropriated in ONSA and for wrongly referring to him as a retired army colonel. This was contained in a press release today.
This was after the commission was lambasted by Justice Gabriel Kolawole of Federal High Court Abuja on March 21.
The last two paragraph of the release seems to be a response to the court order (of March 21, 2017) directing EFCC to retract its previous release. Pleases check PRNigeria Release on Court Stops EFCC Case over Falsehood, Media Trial: https://prnigeria.com/anti-corruption/court-efcc-media-trial/
Meanwhile the last two paragraphs of today’s EFCC Press Release states:
“At the resumed hearing on March 21, the defence brought to the notice of court, the press release of March 8 by the EFCC where the amount involved in the case was given as N38.6bn and the first defendant, Ashinze addressed as retired Colonel. Upon this observation the court ordered the Commission to publish a retraction and adjourned to April 13.
“The Commission states that the error in figure was a mix-up in the body of the release as the headline reflected the correct information. The reference to Ashinze as retired is regretted. We have since discovered that he is a serving Colonel in the Nigerian Army.”