President Bola Tinubu has approved the appointment of Rotimi Oyedepo, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, as the new Director of Public Prosecutions in the Federal Ministry of Justice.
The appointment was confirmed in a statement issued on Tuesday by the State House Director of Information and Public Relations, Abiodun Oladunjoye, who said the decision was made in the public interest.
Oyedepo’s transfer of service from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to the federal civil service was conveyed in a letter dated December 23 and signed by Omolabake Mafe on behalf of the chairman of the Federal Civil Service Commission.
He succeeds Abubakar Babadoko, who is set to retire on December 31, 2025, after completing the mandatory eight year tenure as director.
“Mr Oyedepo, as DPP, will fill the vacancy occasioned by the retirement of Mr Abubakar Babadoko, who will attain the mandatory eight years as a director on December 31, 2025,” the statement said.
Oyedepo, a 2007 law graduate of the University of Ilorin who attended the Nigerian Law School in 2008, is expected to deploy his expertise to reduce reliance on external counsel for critical prosecutions and to ensure greater coherence in the Federal Government’s legal strategies.
According to the statement, he has over 15 years’ experience prosecuting complex economic and financial crime cases at the EFCC and previously headed the commission’s monitoring unit.
He was also part of the legal team that represented the federal government in the high profile P&ID case.
Oyedepo has received several awards, including EFCC Outstanding Staff of the Year in 2014 and Best Financial Crimes Prosecutor in 2019.
