A Nigerian was on Thursday arraigned at an Accra Circuit Tribunal for allegedly defrauding two Ghanaian traders of over 500 million cedis under the pretext of importing surgical products from Nigeria to Ghana for sale.

Rufus Okechukwu Prince pleaded not guilty to conspiring with two others to defraud Mr Kwasi Botwe and Mr Micheal Obeng Addo and was given bail in the sum of 600 million cedis to reappear later this month. One of his accomplices, Frank Agyeman, who was arrested in July last year, is already before the tribunal.

DSP Elizabeth Alomatu told the tribunal chaired by Mr Mohammed Nabon that in May last year, the accused, who then gave his name as Ike, called from Nigeria to inform the traders that he and others had surgical products that they would want to sell to them on wholesale basis.

The traders went to pick him at the airport where they were shown documents on the products, which the accused claimed, were at the Tema Port. Rufus introduced Agyeman and one Martin, who is at large, as his counterparts, who would be helping to clear the goods.

Rufus and his counterparts collected a total of 547 million cedis from the complainants as money required to take delivery of the goods. DSP Alomatu said when the complainants followed up to take delivery of the goods, Rufus and his accomplices told them they rather had fake dollar notes, which they wanted the complainants to distribute.

The traders declined to distribute the fake dollars and the accused persons then went into hiding. Rufus, who was arrested a few days ago, also denied any knowledge of the charges.