Wife of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Patience, claimed that the $15m over
which SERAP allegedly asked the AGF to prosecute her was a gift she
received over the last 15 years from friends and well-wishers.
The Executive Director of SERAP,
Adetokunbo Mumuni, said in a statement on Thursday that the organisation
had been served with court papers in Patience’s suit marked,
FHC/L/CS/1349/2016.
According to Mumuni, the suit was filed
by members of the Union of Niger Delta Youth Organisation for Equity,
Justice and Good Governance on behalf of themselves and Patience.
The plaintiffs sought a court order of
interim injunction restraining SERAP from using any judicial process to
coerce the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice to
prosecute Patience for “owning legitimate private property.”
The plaintiffs also urged the court to
restrain SERAP from “taking any further steps in further vilification,
condemnation and conviction of the former First Lady, Dame Patience
Jonathan, in all public media.”
In the affidavit filed in support of the
suit, the plaintiffs accused SERAP of engaging in a campaign of calumny
against Patience.
The plaintiffs averred, “There has been a
running battle between the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and
Mrs. Jonathan with respect to the release of her legitimately earned
funds, which were deposited in accounts opened in the names of certain
companies by one of her husband’s aides without her authorisation.
“The funds in question were legitimate
gifts from her friends and well-wishers over the last 15 years which she
had been saving in order to utilise to upgrade family businesses and
concerns which had been somewhat dormant by reasons of the long period
of her husband service as a public officer in Nigeria.
“The gifts were given in small
contributions by several persons, some of whom she cannot even now
recall over this period of 15 years sometimes in as small a gift as
N250,000.
“In order to preserve the value of
these funds, which she did not require for any purpose at the time, she
changed them into foreign exchange and kept them as cash for a long
period in her home safe in Port Harcourt and Abuja.
“It was when the family home in Otuoke
was burnt down by hoodlums under the instigation of political
adversaries in 2010 that she began to think about banking these gifts,
which had now grown to large sums in the United States dollars.
“In 2010 she therefore summoned one of
her husband’s domestic aids, Waripamo-Owei Emmanuel Dudafa, to assist
her in opening bank accounts into which the funds could be deposited.
“Unknown to her, the said Dudafa, in a
bid to be discreet about the owner of the funds, decided to bank the
funds in the names of companies owned by him.
“When she discovered this, she was
constrained to continue with the names of the companies when she was
advised that it did not make any difference as to the ownership of the
funds since the director of the company would appoint her as sole
signatory to the accounts in question.”
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