The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has arraigned Bellview and First Nation airlines with an alleged fraud of N1.7bn.

Joined as the first defendant in the charge was the Managing Director of First Nation Airlines, Mr. Kayode Odukoya.

The airlines and Odukoya were arraigned on four counts before Justice Mojisola Dada of the Ikeja Special Offences Court.

The charges border on forgery, use of forged documents, perjury and stealing.

The EFCC, in the charges, alleged that the defendants forged the Memorandum of Loss of Lagos State Certificate of Occupancy registered as No. 33, at page 33, Volume 1011 at the Lagos State Land Registry, Alausa, Lagos.

According to the EFCC, the allegedly forged document was in respect of a property located at No. 29 Oduduwa Street, GRA, Ikeja.

The EFCC claimed that the defendants forged the document “in order that the document be acted upon as genuine.”

Odukoya was accused of dishonestly converting to his own a sum of N1.7bn belonging to Skye Bank Plc.

The prosecutor, Mr. M.S. Usman, told the court that the defendants acted contrary to sections 85, 86(1), 278(1)(b), 285, 361(1)(a)(b), 363 and 364(1) of the Criminal Law of Lagos State 2011.

But the defendants pleaded not guilty.

The judge ordered the remand of Odukoya in the custody of the EFCC.

She adjourned till March 26, 2018 to hear Odukoya’s bail application.