A Lagos businesswoman, Oluremi Phillips, charged with N57.6 million fraud, has opened her defence before the Ikeja Special Offences Court and denied the charges proffered against her by EFCC.

Ms Phillips is standing trial alongside her company, Omritas Energy Limited, on a five-count charge bordering on stealing and issuing dud cheques of N57.6 million.

The witness, who was led in evidence by his counsel, Akin Olatunji, told the court she was one of the directors of the company while her late husband, Oluwasegun Phillips, was the chairman and the chief executive officer.

She confirmed that she knew the nominal complainant, AYM Shafa Ltd, through their managing director, Umar, and they have had successful transactions in the past.

According to her, the managing director of AYM Shafa called her on the phone on October 1 2016, that he needed 500,000 litres of DPK at the Port Harcourt Refinery, and she gave him the price at N155 per litre.

The witness said she received N75 million, paid in N10 million tranches, from AYM Shafa’s account into the company’s account on October 5, 2016.

She said, “Upon receiving their payment, we commenced loading immediately, and the next day, the managing director called me to say that he spoke to his drivers, and they confirmed to him that they had loaded 356,000 litres of the DPK out of the 500,000 litres he paid for.

“He said he would like to purchase an additional 500,000 litres of kerosene. I told him to go ahead and make the payment which he sent another N75 million in N10 million instalments.

“However, after four days of continuous loading, we got an announcement that the refinery would be going on strike and at that time, we had loaded about 640,000 litres out of the one million litres, and we were left with the balance of N360,000 of the DPK. We thought the strike was one or two days affairs, but it went on for a while.”

The witness further told the court that she got another call from the MD of AYM Shafa on October 12, 2016, to ask if there was AGO (diesel), and she told him it was available at their depot in Akwa Ibom.

She said the managing director told her he would also like to purchase one million litres of AGO and that he would send his representative at the depot, Saidu Illiya, to her.

According to her, Mr Illiya came to meet her at the office concerning the AGO and asked her for his commission, but he told her she had already given an agreed price to his managing director.

The witness also said that one week later, she received a call from the managing director, and he apologised, adding that he acted on the information given by Illiya and told her to forget the cheques that her suppliers could supply the product whenever it was available.

She continued that the MD should understand there was no product on the ground, and she did not know when the product would be available as she was mainly in Akwa Ibom to recover the money from the suppliers.

According to her, she received a call 14 days later from Christian Ekemazie, who introduced himself as the head of legal for the complainant’s company and said he would like to see me.

EFCC alleged the defendant fraudulently converted and stole the sum of N57.6 million property of AYM Shafa Ltd meant for the supply of Automotive Gas Oil (AGO), which she failed to supply.

The commission also alleged she issued a Diamond Bank cheque of Nigeria Plc for N14,2 million payable to the company, which, when presented for payment, was dishonoured on the grounds that no sufficient funds were standing to the credit of the account.

Ms Phillips had pleaded not guilty to the charge following her re-arraignment on March 23, 2023.

Justice Ismail Ijelu adjourned the case until March 27 for continuation of trial.

(NAN)