The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has recommended administrative action against 13 public officials over their roles in the scandal involving the illegal Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC).
The recommendation is contained in an ICPC investigation report examining how the organisation, which was not established by a valid legal instrument, gained access to government offices, financial systems and other administrative privileges.
The commission also recommended the prosecution of Adeniyi Adeyemi, the man who presented himself as the Director-General of the PFIPC, for forgery, impersonation, making false statements to public officers and criminal misrepresentation.
The recommendations offer a fresh indication of how deeply the purported agency penetrated the federal bureaucracy before the Presidency eventually disowned it.
The ICPC investigation followed President Bola Tinubu’s directive for a probe into the PFIPC. In its interim report submitted to the President on 6 August, which PREMIUM TIMES obtained, the commission said Mr Adeyemi was never appointed by the federal government and that the PFIPC was not established by any law, executive order or other valid government instrument.
The ICPC recommended administrative action against Mimi Abu, director of the Organisation Design and Development Department at the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation; Rosemary Achem, special adviser on administration to the Director-General of the Budget Office of the Federation; and Patricia Akhigbe, an assistant director at the Ministry of Budget and National Planning.
Others are Aminu Abdullahi, schedule officer, Office Allocation, Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation; Bello Abdullahi, assistant director, IPSAS, National Chart of Accounts, Consolidated Account Department, Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation; Sanni Olubunmi, director, Inspectorate Department, OAGF; and Jousha Kadiri Luka, director, Consolidated Accounts Department, OAGF.
The list also includes Muazu Balami, deputy director, Risk and Review, Inspectorate Department, OAGF; Omameh Florence, assistant director, Inspectorate Department, OAGF; Akinlose Moses, Inspectorate Department, OAGF; Ogaba Harry, chief accountant, OAGF; Esther Orji Okoli, principal executive officer I, OAGF; and Ogunbade Habeebat Ajibola, manager, Compliance and Regulation Department, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA).
The commission also recommended that the affected institutions implement relevant reforms identified in the report.
PREMIUM TIMES reported that Mr Adeyemi used documents presented as official presidential instruments to obtain office accommodation, seek self-accounting status and facilitate the opening of Central Bank of Nigeria accounts for the PFIPC. Several government agencies processed his requests on the assumption that the organisation was a legitimate federal institution.
