THE Federal House of Representatives Committee of Financial Crimes has resolved to recommend that the House invokes its powers to subpoena and arrest executives of Binance.
Media reports state that this followed the failure of the executives of the company to appear in an investigation hearing by the Committee on Monday, March 4.
The Chairman of the Committee, Hon. Ginger Obinna Onwusibe, said the executives of the company were to appear before the House to answer questions on a petition that borders on the financing of terrorism, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial crimes.
However, Onwusibe frowned at the legal representation sent by the company for the hearing, stating that at the last session, it was resolved that the officials must appear by themselves.
But the lawyer representing Binance, Senator Ihenyen, said among other reasons, executives of the company, which is not based in the country, were apprehensive because two of their executives were arrested recently and are still in custody.
In response, Hon. Obinna said: “Binance is not here. We have taken a position on it in our last sitting that we are not going to entertain legal representation from Binance and that position stands.
“Based on the fact that Binance is not here, we need to make a recommendation to the House of Representatives for the House to invoke its powers of subpoena to issue a warrant for the leadership of Binance to be arrested and be brought to this Committee to answer questions of the grave allegations levelled against them in the petitions brought to us by the Empowerment for Unemployed Youths and Niger Delta youths Council.
“This Committee has resolved to recommend to the House to invoke its constitutional powers by issuing a subpoena and a warrant for Binance executives to be arrested and brought to this committee to answer these questions regarding relationship financing of terrorism, money laundering, and other financial crimes as stated in the petition including evasion of tax.
“We thank the petitioners for unearthing these grievous financial crimes going on in this country for more than six years now.”
He then added that Binance has been operating in Nigeria for more than six years and has exploited about 20 million Nigerians during this time frame.
