EFCC probed the alleged fraud indicted Mr Ahmad and other senior officials of stealing or misappropriating about N12.7 billion
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Mr Ahmad had earlier denied any wrongdoing and told PREMIUM TIMES he encouraged an independent probe of the allegations. The other officials, however, refused to comment when this newspaper was investigating the matter.EFCC sent investigators to the REA after receiving a complaint alleging cases of criminal conspiracy, criminal breach of trust, misappropriation of public funds, procurement fraud and money laundering at the agency under the leadership of Mr Ahmad.
They also heard that payments totalling N728.9 million made by the agency to 15 contractors in 2023 for consultancy jobs were “channels for stealing and diversion of public funds majorly because by virtue of the job roles of certain staff of the agency being zonal coordinators, project department as well as monitoring and evaluation department, it was unnecessary, ridiculous and alarming that external consultants were still engaged to execute the same responsibilities.
“That the suspect made false declaration at the Code of Conduct Bureau as he stated that he does not have any factory or enterprise while in reality, he is a director in companies and shareholder in companies.
“That based on the computation, the payments due to Cees Assist Resources Limited and Braintask Value Resources Limited for two days training of staff of the agency as approved, was supposed to be . “That upon receipt of funds in , the Director of Administration and Human Resources Suleiman Bulkwang once again contacted the recipients and gave directives for the disbursement of the funds to various other persons thereby, creating a complex trail of transactions in a bid to launder the funds.
“That the total payments of and made to Cees Assist Resources Limited and Braintask Value Resources Limited exceeded the approval threshold of the managing director of the agency, Ahmad Salihijo Ahmad because his payment approval limit for consultancy services in year 2023 was and below. “That the Director of Finance and Account Abdullahi Sambo, authorised the payments made to the consultant without sighting necessary documents showing that the consultant was engaged upon execution of requisite procurement process in accordance with the Financial Regulation 2009.
“That consequently, between March and June 2023, payments totalling were fraudulently made by the Director of Finance and Accounts into the bank accounts of staff of the department as well as himself as highlighted hereunder: “That Usman Kwakwa, being one of the staff in , was at that time, the Personal Assistant to the Director of Finance and Accounts.
“That the Director of Finance and Accounts also directed Usman Kwakwa to convert the total sum of to United States Dollars; this he did using two Bureau De Change Operators namely Laba Ibrahim and Ahmed Musa. With the fund, the agency decided to procure solar mini-grid and solar lights in selected healthcare facilities and surrounding communities across the country
“That this approach did not give fair value to the government as financial quotation was not sought and received for consideration from other contractors as approved by the Bureau of Public Procurement . “That the approval limit for the Managing Director for ‘works’’ in 2020 and 2021 was & below as any contract cost higher than that would have warranted Ministerial Tenders Board approval outside the control of the Managing Director of the Agency.
“That suspicious payments totalling over were made to various staff of the agency under the guise of fictitious narrations such as ‘survey and data collection’’ and economic sustainability programme’’. “That sadly, some of the projects were also reported as zero per cent executed i.e they were never executed.
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