March 21, (THEWILL) – The Iyalaje of Oodua, Princess Toyin Kolade, has been in a gay mood all week, following her exoneration from a N32.6 billion fraud case that was giving her sleepless nights.
Justice Peter Lifu of the Federal High Court sitting in Lagos struck out the charge against the socialite, sequel to a withdrawal application made by the Attorney-General of the Federation.
Counsel from the Office of the AGF, Pius Akutah, applied to withdraw the charge as a result of a letter from the nominal complainant, Access Bank Plc.
In his ruling, Justice Lifu said that since the case was not heard on its merit, but merely withdrawn before trial commenced, the appropriate other to make is to strike it out and the defendants discharged.
THEWILL had earlier reported how the businesswoman was charged alongside six others before the court by the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) in a charge marked FHC/L/407c/2019, for allegedly obtaining the aforementioned sum by false pretence.
Others charged alongside Princess Kolade are four Indian nationals, Prem Garg, Devashish Garg, Bhagwan Simgh Rawat and Mukul Tyagi, as well as two Britons, Marcus Wade and Andrew Fairie, said to be at large.
Also, four companies, namely Metal Africa Steel Products Limited, Wilben Trade Limited, Kannu Aditya India Limited, as well as Kolade’s Fisolak Global Resources Limited, were charged before the court for the same offences.
Kolade had earlier refuted the allegations of being accused of fraud, claiming that she was contacted by the foreign nationals to clear some goods on their behalf, as a clearing agent, which she did and got paid for the services her company rendered. According to her, the Indian nationals, who supposedly got loans from the bank to carry out their business activities, at no point involved her in their dealings with the bank.
Kolade insisted that she had been fully exonerated by the Police Special Fraud Unit (SFU), which wrote to her and her company and even pleaded with her after discovering she was falsely accused.
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