Pension probe: Senate uncovers N3bn in illegal account

Senate joint committee on establishment, states and local governments, yesterday, uncovered an illegal account with the United Bank for Africa, UBA, holding N3 billion belonging to the Police Pension Office.

The committee’s finding, while probing the management of police pension fund, showed that the N3 billion was deposited in the account on the same day it was opened under the name of Adamu Salihu and DG (director general).

 The account was also said to have been opened with different codes without the authorisation of the Accountant General of the Federation.

The findings prompted the committee to summon chief executives of seven banks in the country to appear before it to explain their roles in the alleged illegalities in the Federal Government pension schemes.

Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde, was also summoned by the committee to appear and answer questions on the controversial account.

The banks summoned to appear before the committee on April 16 are Union Bank, FirstBank, Diamond Bank, GTB, Zenith Bank, Skye Bank and Fidelity Bank.

Chairman of the Committee, Senator Aloysius Etok, while issuing the summons said: “We will not hesitate to use the hammer given to us by the constitution on the banks. They must appear compulsorily on April 16,  2012.”

On illegal N3bn account;

On the illegal N3 billion account with UBA, Executive Director in charge of northern region of the bank, Mr. Dan Okeke, who appeared before the committee said it was unlikely for an account to be opened with such names.

Okeke said: “It will be highly unlikely for two persons to have  the same account. I will be very surprised if that happened in my bank. There could be system failure or computer malfunction, but under normal circumstances, no two names, whether individual or corporate, can have one account.”

He also told the committee that it was normal for the bank to open account in an emergency situation pending the authorisation of the Accountant General of the Federation, adding that the money would, however, be blocked until all parties to the account had met the bank’s requirement.

According to him, “in that situation, we can render a service of urgency to a customer but we would block the fund for 30 days and if nothing happens within that period, we would return the fund to the source to be sure everybody is protected. Simply put, it is possible in such a situation to open an account for a customer.”

Jigawa teacher used as front;

Also two operatives of the EFCC who appeared before the committee told the Senators that a teacher in a secondary school in Jigawa State was used to siphon millions of naira belonging to the Police Pension.

One of them, Mr. Abdullahi Sheik, who went to Sokoto State to monitor payment of the pension to retirees from Customs, Immigrations and Police said he spent six days in the state without meeting with the payment officer.

He said he was, however, told that the man had carried out the payments without his knowledge even when he kept making daily visits to federal secretariat, Sokoto, where the exercise was supposed to have taken place.

Culled from Vanguard.