Indications are that tensions are rising within the management of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigerian Incentive Risk Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL), as President Bola Tinubu’s Special Investigator, Jim Obazee, has swung into action.
Recall that the president had appointed Jim Obazee as a Special Investigator to probe the activities of the CBN and other related entities.
Tinubu, in the letter dated July 28, said the appointment of Obazee, was based on the fundamental objective outlined in Section 15(5) of the Nigerian Constitution and was in furtherance of his administration’s anti-corruption fight.
OsunDailyNG has gathered that Obazee, who is to report directly to the president in a letter dated. August 18, addressed to the Inspector General of Police (IGP), had requested the deployment of four senior officers to his office to assist in the smooth take-off and execution of his task.
In response, the IGP, in a letter titled, ‘Deployment of Police Personnel’ with reference signed on his behalf by CP Abaniwonda S. Olufemi and dated 6 September, granted Obazee.
The letter numberTH:5361/FS/FHQ/ABJ/T.5/428, listed the deployed officers as DCP Eloho Edwin Okpoziakpo, CSP Celestine Odo, CSP Segun Aderoju and DSP Tijani A. Bako.
The team, which is headed by DCP Eloho Edwin Okpoziakpo, is already sending jitters down the spines of the top management staff of the CBN and NIRSAL, as the team has commenced its preliminary intelligence.
Among other intelligence DCP Eloho and his team are said to have developed is that on NIRSAL and the Anchor Borrowers Programme, which have over the years been at the centre of investigations.
It would be recounted that recently, President Tinubu recently gave a marching order that all funds allocated to these agricultural programmes be recovered.
OsunDailyNG learned that there are already corruption allegations against NIRSAL under the former Managing Director, Aliyu Abbati Abdulhameed, who was fired by former President Muhammadu Buhari in December last year.
Sources inside the agency revealed to Daily Trust that the investigators are also set to unravel how the Anchor Borrowers Funds were being kept as fixed deposits by parties close to the embattled CBN governor.
The source disclosed some of the individuals involved in the fixed deposits (names withheld) are currently in panic mode.
It was learned that an aide of the former CBN governor is said to have operated a total of 61 bank accounts that included 44 fixed deposit accounts and 2 treasury bills accounts.
Apart from investigating the N5.6 billion wheat project scandal in Kano and Jigawa states, a source said the investigators would also probe the alleged allocation of about 600,000 monthly for the upkeep of the former MD’s dogs.
Some of the sources also told the platform. that the investigation, which bothers around some contracts at NIRSAL, as well as the Anchor Borrowers Programme by the IGP’S team, is giving top management at the CBN and NIRSAL sleepless nights.
This is said to have led to the destruction of office files and records to scuttle the ongoing investigation of NIRSAL by DCP Eloho and his team, as sources familiar with the investigation said among the destroyed office documents is a contract for the development of the ICT Policy.
“Although financial trails show payments made multiple times for the same contract, the record of this contract has disappeared from NIRSAL’s procurement department,” an insider source revealed.
Another source said unless the investigation team deploys ways and means of obtaining the necessary contract records and documents, they may have hitches getting into the root of the matter.
However, the Head of Procurement at NIRSAL, Sheriff Salaudeen, dismissed the claims that documents were burnt.
He, however, declined further comments, insisting that he would only do so if a written request is communicated to NIRSAL.
