Enugu couple accuses EFCC of reputation damage by illegally taking their photograph and publishing a false account of court hearing in a land case.
A retired Army Colonel and his wife have accused the EFCC Enugu Office of malicious attempt to damage their reputation by publishing a false account of what happened in court on a case involving alleged land fraud.
“We are hereby serving notice that we shall challenge this unfortunate and premeditated effort by EFCC Enugu Office to damage a hard-won reputation through presenting my wife and I as fraudsters and by surreptitiously taking and widely circulating our photo in national newspapers and online platforms.”
Col SS Udeani (rtd)
The couple said the publication which appeared on the EFCC website featured their photo (not a mugshot) “surreptitiously taken at the EFCC Enugu office when we appeared as a routine reporting because of the case.”
“The EFCC Enugu Office presented us as criminal fraudsters in a charge before the Judge at the Federal High Court sitting in Enugu on 4 December 2023,” the couple said in a statement.
The Statement was signed by one of the accused, Udeani Simon Sunday, a school proprietor and retired Army Colonel.
He said that on the strength of his presentation in open Court, the Judge asked the EFCC Counsel question thus “Is it not better to try this case in a civil Court?”
“The judge subsequently reversed his order that we be granted bail in the sum of N5million and ordered our release on self-recognition,” he said.
Col Udeani (rtd) said that he considers the EFCC publication as a premeditated and malicious attempt to damage the reputation he enjoys as a decorated military officer who retired without blemish after 37 years of service.
“This is a case of a quarrel between my wife and the complainant who is her friend, arising from the forcible revocation, by the Enugu State Government, of title to the land that we acquired to expand our school.
“We are not real estate developers but school proprietors. We gave a plot from the space we acquired on compassionate grounds to my wife’s friend for N2.5million, and she paid another N250,000 when we decided to clear and fence the property.”
“The sudden and inexplicable acquisition of the area by the immediate past Enugu State Government dispossessed all of us who were legitimate owners of property in the area.
“We were surprised when former Gov Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi’s government turned around to reallocate the appropriated plots to other individuals.
“We, the original buyers, have been making efforts to get the government to pay us compensation or reverse the order of revocation, given that it was no longer being used in the public interest but reallocated to other individuals after the government acquisition.
“For reasons best known to her, my wife’s friend demanded her money back and refused every explanation to await the outcome of our efforts to get compensation or reversal of the government revocation order.
“It did not also matter to her that we were all in the same boat as my wife and I have lost over 15 plots of land we were fencing to develop a permanent site for our school when the government struck.
“Rather than join in this land rescue effort, she chose to write to the EFCC to accuse of us of defrauding her.
“We explained our situation to the EFCC Enugu Office which, for reasons best known to them, not only decided to treat this as a criminal case but to also charge my wife and I to court.
“We are hereby serving notice that we shall challenge this unfortunate and premeditated effort by EFCC Enugu Office to damage a hard-won reputation through presenting my wife and I as fraudsters and by widely circulating our photo in national newspapers and online platforms,” he concluded.
“Finally, we have no interest in joining the media on the proposed action and hereby demand that they verify and correct what happened in Court as falsely published by the EFCC on its website.
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