If the Bayelsa state governor, Seriake Dickson, has ever given you a phone, there are high chances he has a recording of all messages you ever received and sent on it, all pictures you ever saved on it and any other data you stored or transmitted on that phone.
New information PREMIUM TIMES obtained from the 415GB of internal office records leaked to the public after Hacking Team, the Italian contractor the governor hired to hack phones and computers in Nigeria, was hacked last week shows that at some point in the lifetime of the project, the governor’s office distributed compromised Blackberry phones as gifts to his targets to gain access to their private lives.
The Bayelsa hacking contract was channelled through NICE, an Israeli company and V&V Nigeria, another Israeli company based in Nigeria. While V&V handled the payments, NICE which had stronger business relationship with Hacking Team handled the implementation and operation of the hacking tools.
NICE, however, appointed Skylinks Satellite Communications Limited to represent its interest in the contract. Skylinks, founded in 2006, said its business focus is in advanced satellite communication services to Africa.
Remote Control System
The Remote Control System which is at the centre of the contract, is designed to attack, infect and monitor target PCs and smartphones in a stealth way.
Once a target is infected, RCS allows attackers to access a variety of information, including Skype traffic (VoIP, chat), keystrokes, mails, messages, target positioning, files, screenshots, microphone eavesdropped data, and camera snapshots.
Susceptible operating systems include Windows XP/Vista/7 (32 & 64 bit) and Mac-OS. And smartphones like Windows Mobile, iPhone (jailbroken), Blackberry and Android.
Greek Gift
Email exchanges between Skylinks CEO, Haim Lewy and Hacking Team’s key account manager, Massimiliano Luppi, in July 2013 reveal details of the strategies they applied to resuscitate this hacking solution at a point it seemed it was going to fail.
On the morning of Sunday, 28 July 2013, Haim of Skylinks, apparently on the edge, sent a mail to Luppi in Milan, Italy. It was the third time he was sending that mail. The subject was “the installation in Bayelsa – Third Transmission”.
“This mail is sent to you the third time, it looks to me like you never received it hence you never ignored my (e)mails, maybe some spam issues…” Haim wrote before attaching the complaints.
It was clear in his tone that the project was failing and the governor was threatening to stop payments.
His first complaint was that the slow internet connectivity in Bayelsa was slowing the governor who was monitoring his victims on his phone.
His second complaint and how they handled it is what will leave many politicians in Bayelsa state, especially those who may have received phone gifts from the governor’s office, worried.
Mr. Dickson’s target in the hacking project, according to the email exchanges, are people using the most advanced smartphones and latest Andriod and iOS, suggesting his targets were his political superiors, peers or associates.
As at the time the email was sent, Hacking Team’s solution was a tad obsolete and lagging in spying on newer operating systems.
“The only platform we support fully is the BlackBerry and that made us to give away few phones to some targets just to show the client (Dickson) it is working well,” Skylink’s CEO, Haim, said in the mail.
Haim defended the deception in his mail saying the governor was disputing the workability of the project and “he refused to pay for it this is putting in danger not only the money also our reputation on other deals and projects we have with him”.
It is not immediately clear if the governor was aware of the greek gifts but as at the time the phone gifts were given, a Skylink engineer and two Bayelsans – trained by Hacking Team in Italy – were attached to the governor.
Subsequent emails between Luppi and Haim suggest the problem was solved almost immediately.
“As far as I know, all the issues has (sic) been solved thanks to a constant communication between your company and our support team,” Luppi wrote in an email to Haim, three days later.
The server for the hack attacks and the data collected were later moved to Abuja the following month.
This report first appeared on PREMIUM TIMES and we have their permission to republish
Kaduna State governor, Nasir El-Rufai, has retired 20 permanent secretaries, as he continues his drive to cut costs and generate more revenue for the state. This decision comes after the governor reduced the number of ministries in the state from 19 to 13.
According to a statement by the governor’s spokesman, Samuel Aruwan, five departments will now be headed by permanent secretaries, bringing the total number of permanent secretaries in the state’s civil service to 18.
In a similar vein, governor El-Rufai announced Thomas Gyang as his new adviser on Budget Monitoring and Price Intelligence. Gyang, a 1978 Quantity Survey graduate from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, brings a wealth of experience in government and private sectors spanning 35 years.
Also, the governor appointed Ibrahim Muhammad Aminu to head the state’s Local Government Service Commission, while a former vice-chairman of Kaduna South local government, Ezekiel Baba Karik, will head the State Emergency Management Agency.
Nigeria’s Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, has said that citizens’ access to information and data is a right rather than a privilege, adding that any attempt to deny such it, especially from government, would only threaten good governance.
The Vice President, who is at the Third International Conference on Financing for Development in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, made the declaration on Wednesday at a forum put together by the Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency on the importance of data in monitoring financial assistance for development.
He added that it is governments’ responsibility to ensure that citizens enjoy this right and sanctions meted out when it is abused.
According to a statement issued by the Vice President’s media office, Osinbajo spoke alongside former Prime Minister of New Zealand and current Uniten Nations Development Programme, UNDP, administrator, Helen Clark.
Others included government officials from Belgium and Bangladesh.
“The Vice President noted that such a culture of openness is a basic prerequisite for governments to achieve transparency and accountability in governance,” the statement read.
According to Osinbajo, Nigeria is determined to make sure that citizens are not denied access to information, especially as it affects governance. He noted that the National Extractive Industries and Transparency Initiative (NEITI) project and the Freedom of Information Act played vital roles in the unravelling of hitherto unknown activities in the petroleum sector and government activities.
While applauding the success recorded so far, Osinbajo said more needs to be done in the area of “quality of information and data available” to Nigerians.
African researchers specializing in HIV and Ebola have up to July 30 to apply to participate in the UNESCO-Merck Africa Research Summit – which will provide an avenue for sharing and dissemination of research data on these diseases, especially Ebola which ravaged the West Africa and some part of East African region last year with death toll rising above 10,000.
According to a press statement from the African Press Organization, this year’s summit is getting scientific support from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, the University of Cambridge, UK, and University of Rome, Italy.
Another feature of this year’s summit is the special focus on Ebola and emergent infectious diseases. The summit will also showcase innovative research taking place in projects, programs and initiatives across African universities, and by the wider African research community.
“It also aims to identify scientific research priorities for evolving health needs, and identify opportunities to capitalise on HIV research capacities for emerging infectious diseases in Africa such as Ebola.”
Oyewale Tomori, a Nigerian virologist and the president of the Nigeria Academy of Science, in lending his opinion commended the organisers of the summit and made bold to observe that none of those drugs sent to Africa to treat the Ebola viral disease, EVD, brought it to zero level in the affected countries.
“What we learnt is to practise good hygiene, minimize contact with infected persons- no hugging or kissing of dead bodies, but quarantine them immediately,” Tomori stated.
According to him, if Africa had held such a knowledge sharing summit earlier on in the epidemic, the disease would not have spread that much and had such devastating effect on the people.
As a president of the nation’s advisory body on science, he also agreed with the aim of the summit which is to address the vital role of research in the improvement and sustainable development of population health with specific emphasis on how to translate knowledge into action – the ‘know-do gap’ – to improve health and make an impact on society.
Ebola re-emerged in last year after it was first discovered in 1976 with devastating consequences on health care system. In Nigeria, the notable research on it was by the scientist, Maurice Iwu, where he found that Bitter Kola (Garcinia Kola), inhibited the growth of the Ebola virus in a test tube, but the experiment was inconclusive.
Summit organisers say up to 100 scientists / researchers will be fully sponsored to attend the event which holds on October 19 to 20 in Switzerland and participants would benefit from the scientific program and development opportunities that will accelerate access to innovative health solutions and sustain innovation in Africa.
Their selection will be based on their abstract submission with dead line set at 30th of July.
Abstracts are thus invited from final year African PhD students and young investigators involved in HIV, Ebola and other infectious disease research. All should be primarily based at African research institutes and universities, although collaboration within and outside Africa is encouraged.
Organizers of the summit are optimistic that it will provide a networking platform for dialogue on improving global cooperation on health research and narrowing the disparities in health systems performance between developing and developed countries.
It will also create an African researchers’ network where there will be exchange of experience, knowledge, best practice (especially in Ebola management) and cooperation in future research and development projects.
The News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, said it has begun production of television news and documentaries in order to enhance the content of televisions stations both in and out of the country, particularly with regards to government activities across the three tiers of government.
This was announced by Ima Niboro, managing director of NAN, who spoke at a meeting of the agency’s stakeholders.
According to Niboro, the production will cover virtually every sector, both public and private, and will be distributed to every parts of the country to enlighten the people, especially those in the remotest parts, on activities of government.
“The NAN TV news clips will cover events and happenings in all sectors, including politics, agriculture, aviation, defence/security, the economy, education, the judiciary, tourism and sports, as well as health and gender,” Niboro said.
“Other areas are oil and gas, entertainment, stock exchange data reports, the National and State Houses of Assembly and the Presidency,” he stated.
With dwindling revenue hitting hard on media organisations, this latest development is expected to help significantly reduce cost of production for television stations, as NAN, established 39 years ago, has hundreds of reporters in every part of the country and reportedly services more than 90 per cent of media organisations in Nigeria by providing about 50 per cent of their daily local content.
The managing director also explained that the agency’s multimedia department is being transformed and upgraded to ensure that productions meet international standard.
Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno State has commended the President Muhammadu Buhari’s choice of service chiefs, particularly with three of the newly appointees either from the state or familiar with it.
The governor expressed the opinion that their knowledge of the North east will be crucial in ending insurgency, and that “the fight to overcome insurgents is now or never.”
The new National Security Adviser, Babagana Monguno, and the new Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, a major general, are both indigenes of troubled Borno, while the new Chief of Air Staff, Sadique Abubakar, an air vice marshall, though from Bauchi State, spent a long time serving in the state.
“Yesterday was the happiest moment of my life. President Muhammadu Buhari made a strong statement by his decision to appoint two highly competent sons of Borno to the offices of the National Security Adviser and the Chief of Army Staff. I think his strategy was to get people with ancestral knowledge of the Borno terrain. Major General Tukur Buratai is even a direct victim of Boko Haram attacks,” Shettima said, adding that their appointment was a case of putting square pegs in square holes.
The governor expressed optimism that the war on terror will soon be over, as the president is determined to bring the insurgency to an end.
The governor also charged the T.Y Danjuma-led Victims Support Fund, VSF, to make meaningful contribution in the efforts to rebuild the ravaged towns in the state.
The executive director of Nigerian Foundation for the Support of Victims of Terrorism, NFSVT, Sunday Ochoche, said though their focus is the economic empowerment of women and the education of children, the Foundation will ensure that its mandate is fully implemented in the state and other troubled north eastern states.
“We will be here in Borno state and other states affected by insurgency in the medium and long-run in rebuilding all the destroyed towns and villages, so that the over two million displaced persons return to their respective communities. But the committee’s main focus on economic empowerment of women and the education of children, who had never been in schools since May 16, 2014,” Ochoche told the governor.
According to Ochoche, the VSF’s major problem is the non-redemption of pledges made by Nigerians, with only N20 billion realised from a target of N50 billion.
Hearing-impaired persons in Edo State on Tuesday decried the paucity of qualified teachers in the special secondary school for the deaf in the state.
“It’s not our making to be deaf. But we are out today to break that long silence,” members of the Edo State Deaf Community said as they peacefully marched in Benin, the state capital, to draw attention to their plight.
The leader of the deaf community, Ekhorutomwen Iyobosa, who is also the South-south coordinator, while speaking on behalf of his members, lamented the poor teaching infrastructure available for hearing-impaired persons in the state, including a lack of qualified teachers.
“As we speak now, there’re only four teachers teaching classes 1-3 in the primary schools. So, I urge the governor to employ more special teachers and deaf people into the State’s broadcast outfit, general hospital and all public event,” Iyobosa said, adding that several attempts to see the state governor, Adams Oshiomhole, or draw his attention to their case had proved futile.
He called on the governor to change the office of senior special assistant on physically challenged to SSA on disability matter, adding that the state has as many as 85, 000 deaf people.
Chairman of an anti-graft agency might soon face prosecution for corruption
By Tosin Omoniyi
There seems to be no end to the controversy rocking the Code of Conduct Tribunal, CCT, with its chairman, Danladi Yakubu Umar, swimming in an ocean of accusations relating to corrupt practices, official impropriety and victimization of junior staff under his watch.
On Monday, in a new twist to the corruption allegations flying around at the tribunal, Umar’s personal assistant, Ali Abdullai Gambo, was docked by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, before an FCT High Court on charges of conspiracy, bribery and abuse of office.
Gambo’s arrest and subsequent arraignment followed a petition that he received a bribe of N1.8m on behalf of the tribunal chairman ostensibly to quash a case before the CCT.
The EFCC alleged that Gambo, sometime in August, 2013 in Abuja, made a confessional statement to investigators that the petitioner, indeed, paid the money into his Zenith account on December, 12, 2012.
He, however, claimed that the money was payment made by the petitioner to assist him offset his father’s medical bill. But, he could not give any sensible reason why an accused being prosecuted by the tribunal where he worked would want to support him financially.
The EFCC insists that the claim by Gambo was false and charged him for bribe taking but he pleaded not guilty to the charge.
He was subsequently granted bail after a plea by his counsel, A. F Attah.
However, although Gambo is the person currently in the public gaze because of his arraignment, the shadow of graft and impropriety clinging to the tribunal’s boss is still heavy and many people believe that he was to be the ultimate beneficiary of the bribe and that his assistant only took the fall for him.
Many in fact allege that Umar was the initial focus of investigation and question why his personal assistant, instead of him, eventually faced prosecution.
Some of the other allegations that have been leveled against Umar include misappropriation of the tribunal’s funds, soliciting for bribes and illegal posting of staff opposed to his highhandedness.
Investigations by the www.icirnigeria.org show that the EFCC did invite Umar on March 18, 2013 over an allegation of illegally demanding the sum of N10m from one Taiwo Rasheed, a retired comptroller of customs, who was being prosecuted at the time by the CCT for failing to declare his assets while in office.
The retired customs officer had discreetly reported Umar to the police who had advised him to play along by paying part of the bribe money. Rasheed had subsequently paid the sum of N1.8m into account of the personal assistant of the CCT chairman.
Ali Abdulai Gambo, Umar’s PA
Although the EFCC had invited and questioned the CCT chairman several times over the matter and other allegations of financial impropriety, the anti-graft agency is yet to prosecute Umar over the accusations.
A reliable source at the EFCC told our reporter that the case against Umar has not yet been dropped and that investigators were looking into the series of allegations leveled against him and were quietly sifting the evidence in order to build a solid case against him.
“We do not want to rush into arresting and prosecuting him. We have to start from somewhere. And we did that by inviting him several times. For the records, he has denied all the charges leveled against him especially that of soliciting or receiving bribes from an accused. Although the petitioner insists that he paid Umar through his PA’s account, we have to thoroughly ascertain that this is in indeed a true reflection of what happened,” the source said.
The source added that Umar’s arraignment would be done as soon as the EFCC investigators are able to build a case that would stand in court.
However, aggrieved former staff members at the CCT say the illegal actions of Umar go beyond corrupt enrichment.
He is equally accused of victimization of some staff who subtly or openly condemned his corrupt acts.
On May 3, 2013, three members of staff of the tribunal – the accountant, Shotunde Adeyinka, and two other administrative staff, Johnson Owopetu and Lucky Eronlan – were transferred to Ondo, Katsina and Bauchi states respectively for allegedly opposing some of the corrupt actions of the CCT boss.
The three subsequently appealed the decision of Umar to post them out of Abuja, citing irregularities in the process leading to the posting.
One of the three claimed that they were victimized for calling the attention of the chairman to irregularities in the spending pattern of the tribunal, a move that angered him.
The aggrieved staff subsequently petitioned the board of the tribunal which has deliberated on the issue thrice – June 27, July 2 and 17, 2013.
Part of the recommendations of the panel set up to look into their complaints was that all sanctions against the trio be lifted without further delay and that their salaries, which had been withheld, be released to them immediately.
However, despite this directive, the three said they have not been paid their salaries and entitlements since May, 2013.
The three also petitioned the EFCC, Public Complaints Commission, PCC, and the Presidency on July 1 the same year, alleging corrupt practices and impunity by Umar.
In the petition, Umar was accused of awarding contracts without following laid down guidelines, issuing full contract payment to contractors rather than the legal process of issuing mobilization fees first. Other allegations against him are lop-sided appointments, transfers and promotions without board approval and with total disregard for federal character.
Umar was equally accused of awarding contracts for already completed projects and collection of bribes to facilitate such approvals and also using proxies to corner juicy contracts.
He was particularly accused of diverting monies amounting to about N76.53m for various contracts between February and May, 2011.
One of the aggrieved staff alleged that the hatred displayed towards them by the CCT boss goes as far back as 2011, when Umar’s predecessor, Murtala Sani died while in office.
According to him, Sani died at a time when the tribunal was taking stock of the various disturbing financial inconsistencies that took place in the last quarter of 2010.
At the time, the schedule officer of the tribunal could not produce reliable information about various contract jobs awarded during the period.
Umar, according to him was also accused of being paid a sum of N2.5m from the tribunal’s coffers for unknown reasons, immediately after the demise of his predecessor, an allegation Umar denied.
Perhaps to clear his name, this necessitated the setting up of an investigative committee by Umar, who subsequently became acting chairman, to look into the financial transactions of the tribunal in the last quarter of 2010.
According to the source, a lot of mind-boggling findings were discovered which pointed to a systematic rot and corruption in the running of the tribunal.
Some of the findings included ambiguities in the award of contracts and the bidding process, payment of full contract monies rather than mobilization fees, non-monitoring of projects that funds had been deployed for, usage of post-audit process rather than the pre-audit channel of ensuing accountability and the compromise of the membership of the tribunal’s tenders board.
“There was no adherence to payment procedure which states that 15% mobilization fee should be paid and final payment done after completion. The secretary of the tenders board on his own discretion determined the rates of tenders and registration without following due process. Also, most of the contractors awarded were not registered companies,” part of the final report of the committee stated.
The committee observed among other things that the companies awarded juicy contracts were actually used to siphon funds from the tribunal for selfish purposes.
The investigative panel also found out that all the tender’s board recommendations were carried out without any input from the Technical Procurement Committee as stipulated in financial guidelines of the civil service.
During the course of the investigation, members of the committee also discovered that a member of the tender’s board was also a member of the Procurement Planning Committee which violated financial rules and regulations.
According to sources in the CCT, the recommendations by the committee that certain members of staff of the tribunal indicted be sanctioned as well as the blacklisting of errant firms used to siphon monies of the tribunal were subsequently ignored by Umar, the new CCT boss, who ironically had set up the investigative panel in the first instance.
Recommendations that certain amounts of monies embezzled by both the indicted staff and companies be refunded using legal means and criminal proceedings in some cases were also not implemented.
One of the three staff members victimized by the CCT chairman, who was a member of the investigative panel, said the committee did a thorough job to uncover the enormous corruption at the tribunal.
But he alleged that some indicted staff bribed the CCT chairman to kill the report. According to him, some indicted persons were his superiors at work which made the task more sensitive and difficult.
He said that as a result of his insistence that the recommendations of the report be implemented fully, he was put on the firing line and victimized.
He also alleged that Umar refused to explain an outstanding N18m from the past administration which he spent without following due process.
This, he claimed, the CCT boss used to purchase a jeep for his private use, an allegation our reporter could not verify.
“The chairman wanted to buy a jeep, no advert, no voucher, no bidding, only payment directly. I was directed to capture the document used to buy the car and I used that date intentionally because I wanted to exonerate myself. I was reported to the chairman,” he claimed.
He added that after that incident, he was removed from his department unceremoniously and he had to ‘float’ without a schedule or office for over four months before he was dumped in the ICT department where he was not given any specific duty to perform.
He said later in the year when the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission, ICPC became involved in the investigations to unravel the scam at the tribunal, the chairman threatened to deal with those whom he believed had invited the anti-graft agencies.
He also said that in November, 2014, after consistently trying to make the CCT chairman see reason with them, letters terminating their appointment were given to them stating that the termination took effect from July, 30, 2013.
Interestingly, he said, the board sat on their matter between June and July, 2013, and ordered the CCT to pay all their entitlements and suspend their posting.
When contacted by the reporter for reaction to the allegations, the CCT boss declined comments.
However, he said any enquiries should be made to the chief registrar whom he said was in the right position to speak on the matter.
The registrar, AbdulMalik Shaibu, in company of the tribunal’s spokesperson, Hassan Ibrahim, told the reporter that all the allegations leveled at the CCT chairman were unfounded and aimed at tarnishing his image.
The registrar said even the EFCC had been unable to prosecute Umar on any of the allegations leveled against him of financial impropriety especially that of using his personal assistant to collect bribes.
He added that since the commencement of investigations, Gambo had been removed from serving in the chairman’s office pending the outcome of the court case.
“You know that when you want to pull down someone of repute, all you need to do if you can’t get him or her is to use those around them. The chairman has always denied soliciting for bribes from an accused or using a subordinate to collect same. He has honored the invitation of the EFCC and other agencies of government on this matter and nothing has been found against him even after many years of investigation,” Shaibu said.
He contended that Umar could not have attempted to influence the case against Rasheed as the panel that adjudicated on his case then was made up of three persons.
“Are you saying all the three eminent senior officials of the tribunal involved in the case were compromised? Why is he being targeted alone?” he queried.
He insisted that the chairman was only targeted by the petitioner because of his principled stance in ensuring that the case against him at the tribunal was effectively concluded.
Concerning the three aggrieved staff, the registrar showed the reporter documents detailing the processes that led to their sack.
According to him, their sack followed strict adherence to due process and the extant laws guiding the public service.
He said the genesis of the controversy started when the three affected staff, out of the 25 transferred out of the Abuja office in May, 2013, stoutly refused to go even after the remaining 22 reported at their various new postings.
He insisted that the allegations that led to their eventual dismissal have not been disproved even by the trio till date despite their several petitions to various government agencies.
These, he said, included absence from duty post without authorization, engagement in false claims against management, gross disrespect of constituted authority, unruly behavior, use of foul language against a superior and refusal to carry out legitimate orders.
The registrar said the purported panel that directed the management to cancel their transfer and pay their entitlements was a mediatory one and not official.
“The duly constituted Senior Staff Management Committee, SSMC, empowered to act on issues of staff matters met on July 30, 2013, and after studying the findings of the investigations, approved their dismissal. This was of course after they had been invited to defend themselves against the allegations. At that period, rather than appear to defend themselves, they engaged in writing petitions to organizations like the Human Rights Commission, the Presidency, NJC, House Committee on Public Petitions, Chief Justice of Nigeria and fighting a media war against the tribunal,” Shaibu stated.
“At most of these places they were advised to apologize for their actions and seek for reconciliation. The chairman had nothing to do with their eventual dismissal,” he claimed.
He said the allegations of victimization via use of transfer was untrue as one of the complainants, initial posting to Yola was changed to Sokoto after he requested for a change. He said that despite this, “he refused to go and instead teamed up with the other two to engage in a battle to pull down their boss.”
Shaibu insisted that the accusations that they were being victimized for standing against the chairman’s corrupt practices were an afterthought aimed at currying public sympathy. He attested to the uprightness of the tribunal’s head in the handling of the affairs of the agency since taking over.
A senior officer in the administration section of the tribunal also said that due process was followed before the trio was sacked. These steps – suspension, interdiction and dismissal were followed before they were shown out.
But the three insist that they have been treated unjustly and that their sack is illegal.
They also insist that the committee report discovering corrupt practices at the tribunal which generated the bad blood between the victimized staff and CCT boss, be unearthed, revisited and implemented fully.
They equally want their dismissal reversed and all entitlements paid fully.
The three are currently fighting the battle of the lives using diplomatic and legal channels to get their sack reversed.
The Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act, Chapter 56 LFN 1990 gives the bureau and tribunal the mandate to establish and maintain a high standard of public morality in the conduct of government business and also ensure that the actions of public officers conform to the highest standard of public morality and accountability.
But the bureau has remained largely ineffective over the years due to its inability to achieve any major conviction of high profile personalities in the polity.
The major trial that it has recorded in many years appears to be that of the national leader of the All Progressive Congress, APC, Bola Tinubu which had more media hype than legal bite.
In any case, the case against Tinubu was eventually thrown out for lack of merit.
The irony of the situation is not lost on many watchers of the unfolding events at the CCB as a prosecuting agency set up by government to uphold moral standards has turned into an ocean of corruption allegations, with is helmsman likely to soon face prosecution for corruption.
The Edo State governor, Adams Oshiomole, has accused former Minister of Finance Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, of illegally spending $1 billion from the Excess Crude Account on former President Goodluck Jonathan’s re-election campaign. The governor made the allegation in Benin on Monday at a seminar organized by the state government for its permanent secretaries, directors and deputy directors.
The seminar had the theme “Enhancing IGR in Edo, issues, prospects and challenges”.
The governor said that the former minister had claimed that Jonathan approved the withdrawal of $2.1 billion for the payment of oil marketers but contended that only about $1 billion was paid to the marketers, leaving over $1 billion to be spent on the former President’s re – election bid.
“Now that she claimed she used it, between herself and the last President, they agreed to take the money to pay oil marketers. But if you talk to those oil marketers, they will tell you that within that period, they were paid $1 billion not $2.1 billion. So in truth, about $1 billion was taken for election purposes,” the governor alleged.
Oshiomole, who frowned at what he called the ex-minister’s inconsistent statements on government spending under her watch, said that Okonjo Iweala “would have been declared a pathological liar if she were a witness in court.”
The governor said also that the former minister, who has the added responsibility of being coordinating minister of the economy, needed to explain to Nigerians how the Excess Crude Account was drawn down to $4.1 billion from the peak of $10 billion “when no approval was given by the National Economic Council.”
He noted that “a forensic audit would truly determine how much was illegally spent from the federation account under her watch as Minister.”
Oshiomole stated that although the Goodluck Jonathan government usually blamed the state governments for profligate spending and not saving for the rainy day, the truth is that “many things went wrong even at the federal level” and that “the real weakness in the Nigerian federal chain has been the Federal Government.”
There had been contention between the governors, particularly Oshiomole, and the former minister over spending from and depletion of the Excess Crude Account.
Oshiomole recalled that when he first raised the alarm over the depletion of the Excess Crude Account by over $2 billion, the former finance minister had claimed that the state finance commissioners had agreed through the Federal Accounts Allocation Committee, FAAC, that the money be shared among the three tiers of government, but observed that she later contradicted herself by saying that President Jonathan ordered the withdrawal.
“You have heard of the last instalment of $4.1 billion that was in the Excess Crude Account as of November, 2014, and from that time till today, we have not – when I say we, federal, states and local governments have not touched that money. We have not agreed to take anything out of it, and yet it has been drawn down to about $2 billion. Which means $2.1 billion disappeared,” the governor said.
He recalled: “When I made this allegation after the National Economic Council meeting that the former Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister, Dr Okonjo-Iweala took $2.1 billion without approval and spent it in a manner that was never accounted for, she replied that I lied and said that it was the Commissioners and herself who agreed to distribute that money to the three tiers of government and that FAAC is the most visible expression of our true federalism.”
“Now the Commissioners of Finance met and they looked at themselves and they looked at Okonjo-Iweala and they submitted to Okonjo-Iweala that ‘madam, you lied, not Oshiomhole because in truth, we have no powers to decide withdrawals from the Excess Crude Account and that that power is vested in the State Governors at the level of the National Economic Council.” “Now the former Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, confronted with these hard facts now shifted the argument that ‘oh no it is not FAAC that approved it, it was the former President Goodluck Jonathan that approved it,” Oshiomole stated. The President, the governor noted, had no such approving power.
“President Jonathan as far as the law of Nigeria is concerned, or any President, his approval is limited to funds of the federal government, not funds of the federation. Funds of the federation can only be approved by Governors and representative of the President as reflected in the composition of the National Economic Council, which is made is made up by Governors and chaired by the Vice President, with the CBN Governor and Minister of Finance and others as members,” he observed.
The Edo governor also complained that in four years the state lost about N10 billion from NLNG remittance to the federation account.
“How did I arrive at the figure? I used my 4-Figure Table and I asked myself at $2.1 billion remitted by NLNG as taxes and Shell, and by the way, Shell is not the only oil operative, we have Chevron and several others. They shared the $2.1 billion based on the revenue allocation formula, Edo State got about N2.27 billion,” Oshiomole stated.”
“So I said, thank God this money came after the departure of Okonjo-Iweala and President Jonathan. If the PDP were still in charge in Abuja, this money would have been taken,” he added.
![NIRP Investigative Journalism Training (May 2015 Edition) [Video]](https://www.icirnigeria.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/nirp-training-2015.jpg "NIRP Investigative Journalism Training (May 2015 Edition) [Video]")
