The suspended Chairman of the House Committee on Fuel Subsidy Management yesterday described the audio tape of the $620,000 bribe transaction between him and a businessman Femi Otedola as doctored.He said that it would require forensic evidence to prove this to be true.
He demanded the airing of the entire audio-visual and the complete video for Nigerians to watch.
Lawan made his opinion known in a statement last night through one of his counsel, Chief Mike Ozekhome(SAN).
The statement said: “We are counsel to Farouk Lawan. He has drawn our attention to an audio visual piece of news aired on Channels Television which purported to be a conversation between Femi Otedola and our client, Mr Farouk Lawan.
“We have listened to and watched the audio with our client, Mr Farouk Lawan. On his instructions, we hereby state that the audio is infertile, vague, puerile and inadmissible in evidence by any Court Of Law or Tribunal.
“Professionally, Channels did make the vital point that the audio was “purported to be their voices”. One simple question here: where is the visual of the audio?
“Recall that Otedola had told the whole world that he used the SSS to carry out a so called “Sting Operation”, which showed Farouk Lawan not only pocketing the sum of $500,000, but also putting some under his cap, in Otedola’s Lagos home.
“On Farouk’s instructions, we debunked this allegation and challenged Otedola or the Police and the SSS to produce this complete audio video, unedited and undoctored.
“Otedola had the opportunity of doing this through Channels TV. But he did not. Rather, he brought highly doctored, manipulated and incomprehensible voices purported to be his and Lawan’s.
“He will certainly require forensic evidence to prove this to be true in this highly technologised world of manipulative evidence that can easily turn a man into a woman. Certainly, the audio was a sorry anti-climax to what Nigerians had been expecting.
“Even at that, let us take the audio ‘evidence’ itself for whatever it is worth. The conversation started somewhere in the middle, not from the beginning and ended abruptly.
“Our client hereby still challenges Otedola to air the entire audio visual and also the complete video for Nigerians to see the setting and environment in which the alleged bribe took place, who said what, to whom and for what.
“Secondly, our client believes that the entire footage is devilish, satanic, luciferous, mischievous and completely taken out of context. Even then the audio shows that it is Otedola offering to pay the balance of the alleged bribe of $2.5million, not Farouk Lawan.
The lawmaker said the audio tape has raised many questions than answers.
He added: “Even from what was said, there was no mention of the purpose of the alleged balance of $2.5 million or any mention of Mr Otedola’s indicted companies, Zenon Oil and AP Petroleum, whose desired removal from the Committee’s indicted companies list allegedly formed the fulcrum of the bribe itself. If it was actually a “sting operation”, why is it Mr Otedola and not the SSS officially releasing it on Channels TV? The audio has raised more questions and doubts than answers. Farouk Lawan says it is a doctored anti-climax.”
Channels did not say it got the audio recording from Otedola.
via The Nation
http://www.thenationonlineng.net/2011/index.php/news/52555-my-voice-in-audio-tape-doctored-says-farouk-lawan.html
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