Femi Falana threatens to take legal action
Senior Advocate of Nigeria(SAN) , Mr. Femi Falana has denied claims that he received the sum of N28m from the embattled Acting Chairman Economic and Financial Crimes Commission(EFCC) , Ibrahim Magu who is currently under investigation for embezzlement.
Falana’s lawyer, Adeyinka Olumide-Fusika(SAN) signed a pre-action letter demanding a retraction of the claim published by an online newspaper platform.
The newspaper’s story was based on the Federal Government-owned News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) ‘s report that claimed to have obtained the final report of a prior presidential panel allegedly indicting Ibrahim Magu for being unable to account for the interest generated from N550bn cash recovered from 2015 to 2020.
According to NAN, the presidential panel’s report titled,
‘Final Report of the Presidential Investigation Committee on the EFCC Federal Government Recovered Assets and Finances from May 2015 to May 2020’
was an exposé on embezzlement and other corrupt practices on some EFCC officials, Magu included.
Olumide-Fusika in his letter wrote that the publication was destructive to his client’s reputation as a lawyer seeing as his career has been dedicated to fighting human right abuses and corruption at all levels.
Femi Falana’s lawyer added,
“In the circumstance, my immediate instruction is to demand that you acknowledge your wrongdoing, expressly admit that what you imputed against my client was false, and apologize for your unprofessionalism and the damage you have caused to him.
“I do hope that you will, within the next 48 hours, comply with this gentlemanly request by publication on the front page of your newspaper. Failing compliance, my instruction is to issue a Writ in the tort of defamation in order to afford you an opportunity to prove what you imputed against my client’s character.”