A chieftain of the Labour Party, Dr. Doyin Okupe, was on Thursday morning arrested and blocked from travelling to London, the spokesperson of the Department of State Security, Peter Afunanya, has said.
In a one-paragraph statement Mr Afunanya said Mr Okupe “was intercepted by the DSS at Terminal 1 of Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, this morning at the instance of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)”.
He has since been handed over to the Commisson which requested for the action, the DSS spokesperson said, adding that Okupe was billed to fly to London via Virgin Atlantic Airline before he was stopped.
The Labour Party chieftain’s planned mission to London remained unclear. But the presidential candidate of his party, Peter Obi, is scheduled to speak at Chatham House on Monday, 16 January, to “discuss his vision for policy and governance reforms in Nigeria, including the priorities for tackling deep-rooted insecurity and corruption, and measures to promote social and political mobility for Nigerian citizens”.
It is unclear if the politician was travelling ahead of time to participate at the event.
Okupe was on 19 December 2022 jailed for two years after the EFCC successfully prosecuted him for money laundering.
Delivering judgment on the matter, the judge, Ijeoma Ojukwu, held that Mr Okupe was guilty of contravening sections 16(1) and (2) of the Money Laundering Act, for receiving cash payments without going through a bank, in excess of the threshold statutorily allowed.
The politician was found guilty on a total of 26 counts – from counts 34 to 59 of the charges.
The judge sentenced him to two years in prison on count 34 with an option of a fine of N500,000.
The court also sentenced him to two years imprisonment on counts 35 to 59 with an option of a fine of N500,000. The option of fine is to run consecutively on each count while the sentence is to run concurrently.