by Admin | Nov 1, 2017 | Blog |
Follow @NigeriaPI Director-General of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Mr. Mounir Haliru Gwarzo, It can exclusively reveal, has perpetrated a variety of fraudulent activities since his appointment by former President Goodluck Jonathan for a first term of five years on May 22, 2015. Prior to being appointed successor to Ms. Aruma Otteh as SEC Director-General (DG), Mr. Gwarzo was an Executive Commissioner of the commission. Signs of Mr. Gwarzo’s crooked ways manifested almost immediately he resumed as DG. Documents exclusively obtained showed that on May 26 2015, four days after receiving his letter of appointment, Mr. Gwarzo requested that he be paid the sum of N104.8 million as severance package in respect of the end of his appointment as Executive Commissioner, a position he occupied for two years and four months. The request, made via a memo dated May 26, 2015, was referred to Mr. Chukwuogor Frana, acting Head of the commission’s Legal Department, for consideration and advice. Responding in a memo dated May 27 2015, Mr. Frana advised against honoring the request made by Mr. Gwarzo, arguing that the fact that he remains in the employ of SEC disentitles him to a severance package. Citing an extract of the SEC Board meeting held on July 11 2002, Mr. Gwarzo had argued that he was entitled to a severance package. While offering advice matter, Mr. Frana wrote: “The extract, however, does not contain the term ‘severance benefits.’ Therefore, to give an opinion on this matter, it is impossible to determine the purpose and scope/application of this extract.” Mr. Frana also drew attention to the fact that opening line...
by Admin | Oct 31, 2017 | Blog |
Follow @NigeriaPI The document showed a breakdown of how pension funds were shared to finance pension verification teams to ‘South Africa, ‘Ghana’, and the 36 states’ of the federation, ‘zonal levels’ and others to siphon different sums of public funds into their bank accounts in the name of biometric verification. Out of the N18.4million released to Maina for a trip to South Africa, the Director -General of Budget was allocated N3,056,000 . The per diem for the trip to Ghana cost N9.1 million out of which a former Director of Defence Intelligence received N1,388,000 through his First Bank account. Two female staff of EFCC got N1,275,000 each as part of the national cake. While those who went round the 36 states, allegedly collected N160,471,200 from Maina, a few others were paid N15,477,900 for going around the six geopolitical zones of the country The report gave the details of how Maina allegedly collaborated with former Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Mr. Steve Oronsaye, and two others in N2billion pension funds allegedly mismanaged for biometric contracts. The N2billion was part of the looted N17billion cash. The others are Osarenkhoe Afe and Fredrick Hamilton Global Services Limited suspected as fronts The report added: “Mr. Oronsaye and Maina engaged the services of the following individuals to assist them in looting pension funds. Osarenkhoe Afe: (charged to court together with Mr. Maina & Oronsaye): He is an IT consultant who introduced Innovative Solutions to the OHCSF for biometric enrolment project. He stated that Mr. Steven Oronsaye [former Head of Service) asked him to join the Pension Reform Committee headed by Mr....
by Admin | Oct 31, 2017 | Blog |
Follow @NigeriaPI The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on Monday opposed an application filed by a former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, seeking to be joined as a defendant in a N450 million fraud charge before Justice Rilwan Aikawa of the Federal High Court sitting in Ikoyi, Lagos. Mrs. Alison-Madueke, who is currently in London where she is being investigated for money laundering, is seeking an opportunity to defend the allegations in a charge filed against her, Mohammed Belgore, and a former Minister of National Planning, Abubakar Sulaiman. Mr. Belgore, a governorship candidate during the 2011 Kwara State gubernatorial election, is standing trial alongside Mr. Sulaiman, for allegedly receiving N450 million on March 27, 2015 out of the $115,010,000 paid into a new generation bank by Mrs. Alison-Madueke. Moving the application on Monday, her lawyer, Onyechi Ikpeazu, pleaded with the court to allow her to defend herself in four of the counts in the interest of justice and fair hearing. Mr. Ikpeazu further submitted that the prosecution should remove his client’s name from the charge, if it would not give her an opportunity to defend herself. “It is the fundamental right of the applicant that a criminal proceeding of this nature should not go on in her absence. “We have no objection if her name is extracted from the charge and the case goes on,” he added. In his further submission, Mr. Ikpeazu cited a case involving the Federal Government and Olajide Omokore, a businessman, before Justice Nnamdi Dimgba of the Federal High Court Abuja in which Mrs. Alison-Madueke was mentioned in the charge, though she was...
by Admin | Oct 31, 2017 | Blog |
Follow @NigeriaPI A 29-year-old man, Kehinde Ariyo, has been arrested by the Osun Police Command for allegedly raping an 85-year-old woman to coma at Ilesa town in the state. The police commissioner in the state, Mr Fimihan Adeoye, disclosed this to newsmen on Monday in Osogbo. Adeoye said the incident happened at Ogudu area in Ilesa, where the suspect forcefully had carnal knowledge of the old woman after gaining access to her residence around 11 pm on Oct. 27. He added that the woman sustained various degrees of injuries on her body, including her private organ, and eventually passed out in the process before she was resuscitated at a private hospital. According to Adeoye, the suspect lives in the same area where the victim resides and had gone on errands for the old woman several times in the past. “The woman passed out during the rape, but came back to life after some hours, the suspect was arrested the next day. “This is the height of wickedness in our society. The boy injured the woman in the process, but she has been treated “, Adeoye said. The suspect admitted having committed the act, claiming to have been drunk at the time of committing the heinous act. “Mama asked me to sleep on a couch in the passage. I was already drunk and did not know what happened afterwards,” he...
by Admin | Oct 31, 2017 | Blog |
Follow @NigeriaPI The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has prayed the Federal High Court in Lagos not to order the return of a former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, from the United Kingdom to Nigeria. The EFCC described Diezani’s pleas to be brought back to Nigeria as a ploy to escape justice in the UK, where, according to the EFCC, she is being investigated for several financial crimes by the Metropolitan Police. According to the commission, investigation by the Metropolitan Police in Diezani’s case had reached an advanced stage and her prosecution in the UK was imminent. The EFCC made this disclosure in a counter-affidavit it filed in opposition to Diezani’s application before Justice Rilwan Aikawa, wherein she is seeking an order compelling the Attorney General of the Federation to facilitate her return to Nigeria. In the said application, which she filed through her lawyer, Mr. Onyechi Ikpeazu, Diezani said she wished to appear before the Federal High Court in Lagos to defend a criminal charge bordering on alleged laundering of N450m, where her name was mentioned. The main defendants in the charge are a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr. Dele Belgore; and a former Minister of National Planning, Prof. Abubakar Suleiman. But kicking against the application, the EFCC, in a counter-affidavit deposed to by one of its operatives, Usman Zakari, explained that when it began investigation into the case involving Belgore and Suleiman sometime in 2015, Diezani spurned its invitations to explain her role and rather absconded the UK. Zakari said, “That the applicant, seeing that the investigation by the Metropolitan Police had reached advanced stage and...
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