Mkpoikana Udoma
Port Harcourt — An explosive testimony in court has revealed fresh claims that former Minister of Power and Steel, Olu Agunloye, allegedly forged the contract document used to award the controversial $6billion Mambilla Power Project in 2003.
Testifying before Justice Jude Onwuegbuzie of the Federal High Court, Abuja, the third prosecution witness, Umar Hussein Babangida, told the court that the contract award letter dated May 22, 2003, “was a false representation of itself” and contained “false information and misrepresentation of facts.”
Agunloye is standing trial on an amended seven-count charge bordering on official corruption and fraudulent award of contract in relation to the stalled multibillion-dollar hydropower project.
Under cross-examination by defence counsel, Adeola Adedipe, SAN, the EFCC investigator said: “I wrote the investigation report which was earlier tendered before the court. In the course of investigation, we found out that while serving as a minister, Agunloye awarded a contract for the Mambilla project to SPTCL on May 22, 2003 and the contract letter had been tendered in court.”
When asked whether the document was compared with an original, Babangida insisted the document was inherently fraudulent.
“The award document was a false representation of itself, it was compared with the information contained in it. It contains false information and misrepresentation of facts, I did not compare it with another document because the document itself is a certified true copy,” he said.
The witness also narrated that records obtained from the Federal Executive Council, FEC meeting of May 21, 2003, showed that 40 ministers, including Agunloye, were present; a detail investigators used in reconstructing events around the controversial award.
Babangida testified that he interviewed the then Attorney-General of the Federation, Chief Kanu Agabi, SAN, and former President Olusegun Obasanjo, but no written report was produced because the interviews were oral. He added that Obasanjo had also written a letter to the current AGF on the matter.
“I was not at the FEC meeting of 21st May, 2003 but we obtained the report via a formal request. Apart from the defendant, 39 other ministers were present at that meeting, and I did not interview His Excellency Atiku Abubakar, the then Vice-President,” he stated.
Justice Onwuegbuzie adjourned the case to December 1, 2025, for continuation of cross-examination of the prosecution witness.
