Bello Accused of Mismanaging N48.4bn Bailout, Statutory Allocations
EFCC, ICPC asked to probe allegations
An Abuja-based civil society organisation, Egalitarian Mission for Africa (EMA), yesterday accused the Kogi State Governor, Mr. Yahaya Bello, of mismanaging N30 billion bailout the state received from the federal government and N18.412 billion statutory allocations it received from Federation Account.
Consequently, the group asked the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) to probe the allegation, which it described as alleged monumental fraud and rapacious movement of cash rocking the state government.
The group made the demand in a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Mr. Sadiq Jobi, alleging that the spate of the depletion of the bailout funds and other statutory funds under Bello administration was mindboggling.
Giving details on how the funds domiciled in the state’s bank accounts with Zenith Bank Plc and Access Bank Plc were mismanaged, the group said the allegation “must not be glossed over by any right-thinking anticorruption organisation.”
It alleged that the state government “got N30 billion bailout as follows: N10 billion for infrastructure, N20 billion for salaries. N10 billion out of N20 billion for salaries is domiciled with Zenith Bank, while the remaining N10 billion for local government salaries is domiciled with Access Bank.”
Precisely on July 26, the group alleged that the sum of N 912,648,960.49 “was paid from the infrastructural account number 1010756707 at Zenith Bank to AG Vision Construction Nigeria Limited account number 1920001651 at Skye Bank as part payment purportedly made for the construction of AgasaUkpogoro road, a fictitious no-existing project as at today.
The group alleged that an independent investigation it conducted revealed that nothing of such happened on the road, noting that it suspected the movement of the money especially at this time where four appellants “are challenging his purported election at the appeal tribunal.
“We also note that towards the end of the case at the lower tribunal, the governor approved the movement from the infrastructure account the sum of N1.7 billion account purportedly for a contract to a Lebanese Company, MAJ Global construction Company ltd, owned by one Michel Abboud as CEO.
“The contract was purportedly meant for the renovation of 17 units of houses within Government House. Now the question is why did the government award such contracts without advertising them? Even if the contracts were advertised, how could a single company win all the bids in such a competitive environment as we have in Nigeria today?”
The group provided details about the contracts and their costs, wondering why Bello administration should spend N1,566,655,738.50 to renovate buildings, lamenting what would it cost the state government to construct a new building for a poor state like Kogi.
It said: “Preliminaries cost N 500,000.00; personal assistant residence N56, 831, 620.00; Permanent Secretary residence N55, 393, 500.00; PPS residence N 85,533,500.00; ADC residence N 54,171,150.00; Guest House (Aliyu) Residence N64, 005, 750.00; Accountant General residence N64, 672, 500.00; DG Protocol residence N53, 324, 220.00; CSO residence N 52,916,450.0; CP residence N 50,557,320.00; SSG residence N 52,321,470.00 and Imam’s residence N 47,527,670.00.”
It said the sum of N857, 010,027.501 was spent “to renovate six-unit office building, another sum of N669, 645, 711.00 was spent units residential building, bringing the grand total to N 1,566,655,738.50. Our investigations reveal that nothing is being renovated in most of these buildings.”
Aside, the group said its investigations further revealed that from salaries account number: 1014673585 with Zenith Bank, out of the N20 billion bailout for salaries, the account has less than N1 billion left.
It lamented that civil servants and pensioners “are not paid and are owed seven months salaries. No infrastructural facilities are being embarked on. More startling is our investigation into the federal allocations accruing to the state from January 2016 totaling close to N20 billion with nothing on ground to show for it.”
It said the Bello administration received N2, 580, 000, 000 in January; N2, 690,764,451.52 in February; N3, 516, 357,267.2 in March; N 2,291,476,388.06 in April; N 3,843,118,140.02 in May and N3,490,878,662.89 in June, totalling N18,412,594,909.69
According to the group, this is exclusive of the allocation to the 21 local government areas in the state. Yet Kogi State Government is not paying salaries, no single drainage being done, students have been at home, no subvention to tertiary institutions. So what has Governor Bello done with all these monies?
It added that more shocking “is the spate of shameless deductions from local government accounts using the local government administrators to deduct N20 million each monthly and submitting the cash to the Chief of Staff, Edward Onoja, on the basis that N10 million out of the N20 million is for the repayment of vehicles bought for them.