A prosecution witness has told a court in Nigeria that the chairman and CEO of First Nation Airways (Lagos), Kayode Odukoya, managed to secure NGN1.7 billion naira (USD4.7 million) in loans from the now-defunct Skye Bank by using forged documents.
Patrick Ogo, a legal officer at Polaris Bank, which took over Skye Bank's assets in 2018, was testifying at the start of a trial over Odukoya's alleged theft of N1.7 billion, the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reported. Nigeria's Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is prosecuting the case at Ikeja Special Offences Court.
Ogo, the trial's first prosecution witness, said that Odukoya had obtained various loan facilities from the bank between 2007 and 2012. Odukoya had also been chief executive of Bellview Airlines (Lagos), which went out of business in 2010.
After the loans were disbursed, investigations by the bank and the EFCC found that documents relating to properties put up for collateral for the loans turned out to be forged.
Odukoya was arraigned on March 15, 2018, and has pleaded not guilty to a four-count charge of forgery, use of false documents, perjury and theft, NAN reported. The case has now been adjourned until June 24.
First Nation Airways had two A319-100s on its AOC, both of which are currently inactive (one is stored in Lagos the other at Kaunas International). According to the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), as of January 2019, the carrier's AOC is currently inactive given it suspended commercial flight operations in May 2018.
