The Department of State Services (DSS) has arrested Faisal, son of the former Chairman of the defunct Pension Reform Task Team, Abdulrasheed Maina, and handed him over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
Security sources disclosed that Faisal’s arrest followed intelligence indicating that he had secretly returned to Nigeria.
“His arrest followed credible intelligence that indicated that Faisal had secretly returned to the country,” a source said.
The source also stated that DSS operatives tracked and arrested him in the Karsana area of Abuja before handing him over to the EFCC.
Faisal had been evading capture since 2020, when the EFCC arraigned him on a three-count charge related to money laundering.
In October 2021, the Federal High Court in Abuja found him guilty of money laundering and handed him a 14-year prison term.
The trial judge, Okon Abang, ruled that the EFCC had proven Faisal ran a fictitious account with the United Bank for Africa, through which his father allegedly laundered N58.1m.
The court stated that the funds were deposited into an account bearing the name Alhaji Faisal Farm 2 and were withdrawn by Faisal and his father between October 2013 and June 2019.
In November 2022, the Court of Appeal affirmed Faisal’s conviction but cut his sentence from 14 years to seven, holding that the trial court should not have given a first-time offender the maximum penalty.
His father, Maina, served time in prison for laundering pension funds before being released and later facing further legal troubles.
