The National Commandant of the Peace Corps of Nigeria, PCS, Dickson Akoh, was on Wednesday arraigned before the Federal High Court, Abuja, on a 90-count charge of fraud to the tune of N3.5 billion.

Akoh and his company, the Incorporated Trustees of Peace Corps of Nigeria, ITPCN, were accused of laundering an aggregate sum of N3.5 billion obtained from extortion in April 2016.

According to the charges, Akoh and his group, despite parading themselves as a non-profit making organization, went about unlawfully engaging in the business of providing security services under a recruitment scheme which involved quasi-military training without approval.

The Peace Corps commandant was also accused of obtaining huge sums of money by false pretence and laundered proceeds of extortion from unsuspecting Nigerian citizens moving same from the ITPCN account to his personal account.

Akoh pleaded not guilty to all the charges.

It would be recalled that the Police along with personnel of the Nigerian Army and the Department of State Services, DSS, on February 28, stormed the headquarters of the Peace Corps and arrested its national commandant, Akoh alongside 49 other members of the group.

The police later issued a statement explaining that it waded in to arrest the PCN head because of credible intelligence report it got that the group’s members were  bearing arms and planning a terror attack.

“Credible intelligence reports at the disposal of the Force revealed that some of these illegal Security outfits have started acquiring weapons and conducting covert military training in different locations across the country,” read the statement issued on March 1 by the Police Public Relations Officer, Jimoh Moshood.

Also, the PCN was accused of opening “illegal training camps in some states of the country, where thousands of youths and other persons without proper background checks and screening are receiving convert military training.”

“The Nigeria Police Force and other Security Agencies will not fold their arms and allow lawlessness to be unleashed on the society,” Moshood stated.