The spokesman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign council, Festus Keyamo, said Bola Ahmed Tinubu was not indicted in the drug dealings in the United States.
He said the funds linked to Bola Tinubu in the United States were tax deductions, not drug proceeds.
Keyamo said on Wednesday during an interview on Channels Television.
Over the past few months, there has been public scrutiny of the background of Tinubu, APC presidential candidate.
The former Lagos governor has also been accused of alleged involvement in drug trafficking in the US, an allegation that has elicited varied reactions on social media.
On Tuesday, the social media was awash with what appeared to be certified true copies of a settlement order issued by a US court domiciled in the northern district of Illinois regarding forfeiture of funds in some bank accounts linked to someone named “Bola Tinubu”.
According to the court documents, there was probable cause to believe that the funds in bank accounts linked to the named Tinubu were proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
The court ruled that the sum of $460,000 in one of the accounts be forfeited to the US government.
The court document also shows that the case was heard in the US in 1993.
Speaking on the court documents, Keyamo said the former Lagos governor was not sued or indicted on any charge, adding that the case was regarding the funds in 10 bank accounts linked to Tinubu.
Keyamo said Tinubu took responsibility for all the 10 accounts because they were also traced to his mother and “relatives”.
He also said Tinubu was roped in the drug trafficking case of two Nigerians who once stayed in separate flats in the same building where the ex-governor stayed at a time in the US.
“He, Asiwaju, went to open an account, the address by which he opened the account was already used by these people…investigated for narcotics,” he said.
Keyamo further stated that Tinubu was an employee of Mobil Oil and not a treasurer of a drug cartel.
He explained that Tinubu deposited some funds in bank accounts in the US as investments and got returns on those investments.
The spokesman said the banks were supposed to deduct taxes from the investments but they did not and this was not a “deliberate act” on the part of Tinubu.
“The deposits he made there (in banks) are what bankers called investments; he kept the money there and he was getting interests. They (the US government) said he had not paid tax on those interests. That is all and guess what? The banks are supposed to deduct the tax from the source.
“Out of the 10 accounts, it was only one account – the one in Heritage Bank – that they took $460,000 as the tax on interest that he benefited on the investment he made in those accounts.
“In fact, all the money in Heritage Bank was not taken; they took only $460,000 as tax,” Keyamo said.
Keyamo insisted that there was no criminal indictment or conviction against Tinubu, alleging that the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was behind the reincarnation of the controversial court document.
“His (Tinubu’s) detractors kept bringing up these issues over and over when his political profile is rising, when he wants to run for office or any political turn in his life, they will bring up these issues,” Keyamo said.
“The date on the papers flying up and down, the date of certification is 2022, so they are using this to confuse people that these are fresh papers. If documents are 40 years old or 100 years old, once you go to court, and apply for certified true copies of those documents, they will give you those documents but they will stamp the day they are giving you those documents.
“This is what our detractors, the PDP, perhaps that is what they went to the US for when they pretended that they went for high-level engagement. This is part of the high-level engagement they went for.”
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