Another N35bn Pension Scam Uncovered At Office Of Head Of Service Of The Federation
A few months after the dissolution of the Abdulrasheed Maina-led Pension Reform Task Team (PRTT), another stolen N35 billion pension fund has been uncovered at the office of the Head of Service of the Federation (HoSF).
The head of service, Alhaji Bukar Goni, was said to have hijacked the payment of pensioners even before the task team was unofficially disbanded.
The media consultant of PRTT, MrOlajide Fashikun, who disclosed this during a press conference, expressed shock that the nation’s economic saboteurs who were bent on destroying the future of retirees resorted to using falsified documents to defraud government to the tune of N35bn.
LEADERSHIP FRIDAY gathered that 13 senior civil servants linked to the fresh scam have been arrested and are cooling their feet at the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission
(ICPC).
When contacted, the spokesman of the anti-graft commission, Mr Folu Olamiti,confirmed the arrest: “I just confirmed that we have carried out a series of investigations in that office. Specifically, we have been going in and out of that office and have concluded investigations and transferred some of those found wanting to court.”
Meanwhile, the media consultant to the PRTT who cautioned Senator Aloysious Etuk to count him (Maina) out of his political perils, as neither he nor the task team has a prior knowledge of the petition to the EFCC and ICPC entitled “Corrupt enrichment and acceptance of N50,000,000 bribery, cars, landed property and industrial equipment leveled against the chairman of the Senate Committee on Pension and Establishment”.
Fashikun, while responding to Senator Etuk’s allegations that he was the brains behind the over-bloated petition by ShuaibuTeidi’s lawyers, challenged him to show proof of where he was named by the staff and friends of the pension suspects.
He noted that it is the revealing nature of the petition which has unraveled too many truths yet untold and is seemingly too heavy for the senator and a few of his friends to bear. He called on both anti-graft agencies to urgently open up investigation.
He said, “The PRTT strongly believes that all this accusation is in a bid to stave the two anti-graft agencies from doing what they are statutorily supposed to do when they open up the investigation. In fact, this is why Senator Etuk and his colleague in the committee, BabafemiOjudu, are screaming blue murder. Even when they cannot eat in their houses, the cause certainly must be Maina.”
While recalling that he was muscled by a combination of forces that are desperate to sustain and retain the status quo ante of pension thieves, Maina stated with equanimity that the senator’s ordeals signifies that God is at work.
He continued: “Why and why now did this come forth and from the quarters it is coming? It is our firm belief that facts laid out in the petition are too deep for anyone who is not involved to have so delivered. This is why investigative journalism should be upped to dig and relate the unfolding events for the nation’s good.
“The police, ICPC and EFCC should be interested. The petitioners are alive. They are not hidden. Their names were revealed with contact details. They should be invited to help the nation get the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.”
