Two Binance executives — an American and a British-Pakistani — have been detained on the orders of National Security Adviser (NSA) Nuhu Ribadu over alleged involvement in foreign exchange manipulations in Nigeria.
Their names were not made available.
It was learnt on Wednesday night that the Binance executives were detained following after a Federal Government obtained a 12-day detention order vide a Court Warrant pending further investigation by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over alleged violations of the finance laws of Nigeria.
They were taken into custody at a Guest House operated by the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA).
The two Binance executives allegedly flew into Nigeria on Wednesday following the Federal Government crackdown on Cryptocurrency exchange and were immediately detained. The government plans to ban Cryptocurrency trading owing to alleged sharp practices through their websites.
Speaking on Tuesday after the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Dr. Olayemi Cardoso, claimed that billions of dollars had passed through the channel from unidentified sources.
The CBN boss said: “In the case of Binance, in the last one year alone, $26 billion passed through Binance Nigeria from sources and users who we cannot adequately identify.
“We are concerned that certain practices go on that indicate illicit flows going through a number of these entities and suspicious flows, at best.”
The NSA has asked Binance to provide the data on its operations in Nigeria in the past seven years but the detained executives reportedly demurred.
The arrested executives declined a request to delete all Nigerian information from their platform, insisting that they would not do so until they are taken to their (countries’) embassies.
