‘EFCC Chair I’m Not Lying, $31.4million in My Bank Account is for UK Medical Expenses’ -Patience Jonathan, former Nigeria’s 1st Lady
*Cries Out: ‘Anti Graft Agency officials Intimidating, Embarrassing, Wrongfully Harassing Me’
*Lament: ‘Since 2013, I am Still Owing the London Hospital’s Medical Bills’
‘My Intestines, Tummy were Opened in Seven Different Surgeries’
*Echoes: ‘God Kept Me Alive with a Second Chance Miracle’
*PLUS How God Woke her up After Seven Days of Coma
BY AJANI KUSORO/ANTI-GRAFT REPORTER, ABUJA
EMBATTLED Wife to Nigeria’s Former President, Patience Jonathan is raising the alarm that men, women of Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, are intimidating, harassing, embarrassing, disparaging and disgracing her due to a lump sum of $31.4 million in United States dollar found in her Skye Bank account meant for payment of her accrued medical expenses in London.
Patience regretted that the ‘No Debit Withdrawal/Freezing Order’ placed by EFCC on her Skye Bank account number 2110002207 had caused her so much pain, discomfort and unhappiness as she could not offset her accrued medical bills to a London Hospital that performed seven various surgeries on her intestines and tummy since three years ago. She is more saddened by the opprobrium that is presently trailing her name and personality all over the country and beyond the shores of Nigeria. She strongly believe that her fundamental human rights had been violated by EFCC without been notified before the freezing order.
In an emotional letter she writes directly to the Acting EFCC chairman, Ibrahim Magu, the former Nigeria’s First Lady explained that the $31.4 million rumored to be connected to the financial fraud perpetuated by Waripamo Dudafa who served as Special Adviser on Domestic Affairs to former President Goodluck Jonathan was for the payment of the medical bills she incurred in London in 2013. She absolves herself of any financial fraud, as she claimed she never lied on her serious health issues.
The monies in a local bank and claimed by Patience were placed on a ‘No Debit Order’ in the course of investigations into the financial affairs of Waripamo.
Patience Jonathan claimed ownership of the $31.4 million in the affidavit before a Federal High Court in Lagos. In the affidavit by Sammie Somiari a legal practitioner on behalf of Patience Jonathan claims that it was Dudafa who helped Mrs Patience Jonathan to open the four bank accounts which the EFCC froze. This made the EFCC to file an amended 17-count against Dudafa and seven others, including the four companies, with the defendants being accused of conspiring to conceal the monies which the EFCC claimed they ought to have known formed parts of the proceeds of an unlawful act.
In a letter written on behalf of Patience to the Acting Chairman of the EFCC by her lawyers, Granville Abibo (SAN) and Co. enjoined the EFCC and Skye Bank to lift the restriction placed on the accounts.
In the letter Patience Jonathan admitted that the she is the sole signatory to the accounts and the accounts were card-base. She further went to say that she has been using the account to pay for her medical bill and other personal purposes and that she is a law-abiding citizen.
Her words (unedited): “It is noteworthy to emphasise that the said accounts, which were in US
dollar denomination, were card-based accounts and our client is the sole signatory to these accounts. I have been operating the said accounts using the cards for my medical bill payments and purchases for my private purposes without any let or hindrance.”
Her lawyer letter reads: “Our client was therefore surprised when the said cards stop functioning on July 7, 2016, or thereabout. Our client immediately, thereupon, contacted Skye Bank Plc
through our solicitors. It was only then that the bank officials informed our client that the said accounts were placed on a ‘No Debit Order’ following investigations and instruction from your commission and this is without notice to our client by either the bank or the commission.
“It is in the light of the foregoing that we urge you to use your good offices to vacate the ‘No Debit/Freezing Order’ placed on the said accounts. Despite the foregoing, our client, who is a law-abiding citizen, has watched with surprise how efforts are being made surreptitiously to indirectly harass or harangue her and short-change her of her personal funds in breach of her fundamental human rights. We urge you sir, to kindly intervene to stop the untoward and wrongful actions of your officials to embarrass, inconvenience and short-change our client.”
It would be recalled that Madam Patience, on the 17 of February in 2013, said she died and woke up after seven days during her illness for almost three months. According to her testimony in 2013, she said she underwent seven surgery operations within one month and the doctors had given up hope on her survival. She explained: “I remember when Chief Obasanjo was the President of the country, I was close to his late wife, Stella. We worshiped together in this chapel. It was a painful moment for me that time when she (Stella) died and her corpse was brought here. That was how my corpse would have been brought here.
“It was not an easy experience for me. I actually died, I passed out for more than a week. My intestine and tummy were opened. I am not Lazarus but my experience was similar to his. My doctors said all hope was lost.
How God Woke her up After Seven Days of Coma
“A black doctor in London who is with us in this service was flown in when the situation became critical. It was God himself in His infinite mercy that said I will return to Nigeria. God woke me up after seven days. I know that some people somehow leaked the information that I was dead. They are people that I trust and rely on; to them, I was dead and I would never return to the country alive. Some of them even sold my things off. I won’t say everything here. It is the Lord’s doing that I returned alive.
“When God says yes, nobody can say no. People are always afraid of operation (surgery) but in my own case, while my travail lasted, I was begging for it (surgery) after the third operation because I was going to the theatre everyday.
“It was God who saw me through. I did eight or nine operations within one month. It was not an easy one. The day I came back, I said God I have nothing to say, I offer myself to you. I will be doing things that will touch the lives of the less privileged. God gave me second chance.”