Hot Source- Airline company faults anti-graft agency over failure to reflect Odukoya’s court victory online
Wale Igbintade
Chief Executive Officer of FirstNation Airways Limited, Kayode Odukoya, has criticised the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for failing to update its official website to reflect his acquittal, nine months after the Lagos State Special Offences High Court cleared him of all fraud charges.
He said the omission had prolonged the reputational damage caused by the case and fuelled continued public misconceptions about his integrity.
Odukoya, who was arraigned alongside the airline in 2018, had faced allegations of fraud, forgery, and stealing over credit facilities obtained from Polaris Bank.
But in a landmark judgement delivered in December 2023, Justice Moyisola Dada dismissed all counts, declaring that the EFCC’s case “collapsed like a pack of cards” due to unreliable and inadmissible evidence.
Despite the acquittal, the commission’s online case-tracking portal still shows the matter as pending.
FirstNation Airways described this as an “unjust extension of media trial” that undermines the principle of presumption of innocence.
Justice Dada had held that the prosecution failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt, faulting the EFCC’s reliance on a disputed “Memorandum of Loss of Certificate of Occupancy.”
The judge said the document was a mere photocopy without authentication, lacking any proof it was received or acted upon by the bank.
“The totality of the prosecution’s case rests on quicksand, collapsing like a pack of cards,” she ruled, acquitting Odukoya and the company on all charges.
Odukoya lamented that even though the court had vindicated him, the EFCC’s silence online meant the public still perceived him through the lens of the original charges.
“For years we were portrayed in a narrative that undermined our professional integrity,” he said. “Even after the court’s decision cleared us, the EFCC’s refusal to update its records continues to fuel reputational harm.”
The airline described the omission as evidence of a broader problem with how regulatory bodies manage high-profile cases, particularly when acquittals do not receive the same visibility as criminal charges.
FirstNation further accused the EFCC of straying from its statutory mandate by criminalising what it described as a contractual dispute with Polaris Bank. It urged the Attorney-General of the Federation and other stakeholders to institute reforms that would prevent malicious prosecutions and ensure balanced public communication when defendants are acquitted.
“This episode is a stark reminder of the dangers of conflating civil disputes with criminal conduct,” the company stated. “True accountability requires not only proper investigation but also the willingness to correct the public record when the courts have spoken.”
The company stated that the failure to update the commission’s website had drawn attention to the impact of prolonged “media trials” on defendants who eventually secure acquittals.
The post FirstNation: EFCC Yet to Update Website Months After CEO’s Acquittal appeared first on THISDAYLIVE.
