Abba Kyari, the increasingly controversial Chief of Staff to President
Muhammadu Buhari, is at the center of another unwholesome saga that is likely
to reinforce further
the view that the Buhari administration’s anti-corruption
stance is a ruse. This time, an investigation by SaharaReporters found that Mr.
Kyari has been fiddling with the finances of the Nigeria High Commission,
London, where the country’s resources are being dubiously deployed for
questionable or illicit purposes. Also involved in the costly financial mess
are Adah Simon Ogah, Nigeria’s acting High Commissioner, and Omolayo Akinfala,
a special assistant to Aisha Buhari, the president’s wife.
Our investigators found that the High Commission, under Mr. Ogah,
frequently authorized payments from revenue generated by the High Commission for
medical treatment of senior political officials visiting the United Kingdom.
The funds disbursed for such medical payments come from revenues the High
Commission generates through fees for passports, visas and other consular
services. The use of such funds for medical payments is an anomaly as medical
bills for government officials are already provided for in the Presidency
budget.
Nigerians resident in the UK are unaware that they paid Mr. Kyari’s
medical bill when the president’s chief aide was treated at Wellington
Hospital, St. John’s Wood, London, in December 2016. This happened at a time
the government blamed its failure to issue passports to UK-resident Nigerians
on a lack of funds.
A letter signed by Mr. Ogah and addressed to Professor Paul of Wellington
Hospital provides a confirmation of the role of the High Commission in Mr.
Kyari’s treatment. Dated December 1, 2016 and titled “Letter of Guarantee In
Respect Of Alhaji Abba Kyari,” Mr. Ogah’s letter stated: “I write to confirm
that the Nigeria High Commission, London, United Kingdom, will guarantee the
payment of all medical bills of Alhaji Abba Kyari, Chief of Staff to the
President, Federal Republic of Nigeria.”
Mr. Kyari’s case, however, is just a tip of a massive iceberg of seedy
financial and administrative practices at the Nigerian High Commission in the
UK. Our investigators discovered the equally improper case of Mr. Akinfala, a
special assistant to Mrs. Buhari, whose employment contract with the Mission
was recently renewed by the Acting High Commissioner. Curiously, Mr. Akinfala
remains on the High Commission’s payroll despite being based in Nigeria and
paid by the State House. He also receives financial perks whenever he visits
the UK with Mrs. Buhari.
On August 3, 2016, Ibrahim Sule Dan’Agundi, the Head of Chancery (HOC),
signed a letter approving Mr. Akinfala’s application for contract renewal with
the High Commission. A day earlier, on August 2, an originating letter had
recommended that Mr. Akinfala be considered for a one-year contract extension.
Protocol documents dated December 19, 2016, and obtained by
SaharaReporters showed arrangements for the arrival of Mr. Akinfala and one
other person from Lagos to London. The document revealed that the High
Commission spent its financial resources on foreign travel allowances for which
there are budget allocations for the Presidency covering the President, his
household, and staff.
Our inside sources in the UK, and Abuja revealed that the High Commission
spends a minimum of £7,000 for hospitality on each of Mrs. Buhari’s trips to
the United Kingdom. Last year alone, Mrs. Buhari visited the UK at least seven
times. The finding was confirmed by a High Commission document dated July 28,
2016, and signed by Ibrahim Sule, Minister Counselor/Head of Chancery. “The
Mission was also informed that Her Excellency and members of her entourage
would be staying at the vacant house/official residence of High Commissioner.
In this regard, given the above scenario, there is the need for the Mission to
provide hospitality to the First Lady and members of her entourage. To this
end, I wish to kindly recommend to His Excellency to consider and approve the
sum of £7,000 to carry out the hospitality expenditure for the wife of the
President, members of her family and entourage,” stated the latter. The request
was approved the same day.
Apart from feting Mrs. Buhari and aides as well as treating officials
like Mr. Kyari like royalty, the High Commission also engaged in a variety of
contract scams, notably through payments to contractors for jobs not executed
or those executed at grotesquely inflated costs. Documents exclusively obtained
by SaharaReporters show that the sum of £14,100.80 was paid to a company,
Savanna Construction Limited, for what was described as “call out report on 31
air-conditioning units in the High Commission building”. The curious
transaction was captured in a letter dated July 19, 2016, and signed by S.U.
Kpohraro, Chief Security Officer (Admin). The Head of Chancery (HOC) signed the
approval, which was granted the same day.
Despite the substantial payment, our investigators discovered that there
was no work executed at the building that matched the quoted job. Nigerians who
work in or visit, the building, told our investigators that the high numbers of
air-conditioning units do not exist and that none of the existing units were
ever serviced. They spoke about the unbearable heat in the High Commission
building during summer periods.
Savanna Construction Company also got the contract for the supply and
Attention of new scaffolding as well as the dismantling of an older one. The
contract, which cost £9,600, was detailed on July 15, 2016, document signed by
Mr. Kpohraror. Savanna also got paid £7,440 for another bogus job, taking care
of the High Commission’s blocked toilets. Our sources revealed that similar
scams were used to pay for the provision of cleaning, security and other
services by dubious suppliers hired by the High Commission and top officials of
the Nigerian Mission hire.
Our sources disclosed that Mr. Dan’Agundi, Head of Chancery, has been the
beneficiary of regular and unlawful cash payments from locally recruited High
Commission staff, who are either due to retire or should have been retired long
ago. Our investigators found that some of the employees in this category were
employed in the 1980s. Many of them are stuck in the old, inefficient and
corrupt ways of providing services, a development that is blamed for the
frustration of Nigerians who require consular services.
One source pointed to the case of one Mr. Salihi, a local staff in the
Education and Welfare section. The Mission fired Mr. Salihi on account of his
poor communication ability and general inefficiency. Strangely, Mr. Ogah
reversed the decision, re-hiring Mr. Salihi without explanation.
“It is a depressing and horrifying experience for Nigerians who have
cause to interact with the Nigerian High Commission in the UK, either when
approaching the High Commission for consular services such as immigration
queries (visa passport issuance/renewal, travel certificates) or other services
such as trade and investments enquiries as well as tourism and general business
information for Nigeria,” a Nigerian entrepreneur in London said. He added,
“The inept staff are never interested in offering services without monetary
inducement. As a matter of fact, they purposely make the official process
cumbersome and frustrating so as to increase the possibility of financial and
other types of inducement.”
Some disaffected staff told SaharaReporters that the rogue employees
operate with the full knowledge and approval of the acting High Commissioner
Mr. Ogah, who reportedly runs his own individual racket. They accused Mr. Ogah
of running the High Commission’s cash and petty cash payments like his personal
Automated Teller Machine (ATM). They said Mr. Ogah uses the guise of
“contingency allowance” to embezzle funds.
Mr. Ogah is officially entitled to £3,000 monthly for domestic servants
in his personal residence, £1,000 monthly for the upkeep and maintenance of his
office, £200 per trip for contingency, while all his utility and medical bills,
as well as living costs, are borne by the Federal Government. He also pays no
rent. In spite of the generous perks, Mr. Ogah regularly inflates entitlements
and, in many cases, fails to provide receipts or to retire most of his supposed
expenditures in violation of rules. On September 2, 2016, acting Finance
Attaché, R.E. Otiode, wrote a memo regarding Mr. Ogah’s regular failure to
retire expenses. “I am directed to inform you that available records show that
you are yet to retire the following advances granted you in the course of
official assignments,” stated the memo, which added that retirement of expenses
should not take longer than three months. In each of the said cases, Mr. Ogah
took the sum of £500 as contingency allowance for trips to Manchester and
Northampton on June 28 and July 15, 2016. The sums he took were more than the
£200 of local contingency allowance he was entitled to.
Other top officials of the Mission were accused of practicing another
strain of financial stunt by overstating invoice payments. For example, the
High Commission manually generated an invoice of £10,000 for the use of a VIP
suite at London’s Heathrow Airport. The amount represented six times the actual
cost of £1,750 per use. A confirmation of the actual cost could be gleaned from
a letter signed by E.A. Agom and dated July 11, 2016. The letter stated that
the cancellation of the booking of a VIP suite for Mrs. Buhari’s proposed visit
to London on July 10, 2016, meant that the High Commission lost £1,750 for the
slot, while an additional £200 was charged as penalty for an undeclared
passenger on her entourage.
Several sources also disclosed to SaharaReporters that the current
leadership of the High Commission only approves the use of High Commission
facilities like the Banking Hall, an event venue, for use by Nigerian
organizations it deems less critical of the poor service and poor
representation of the interest and welfare of Nigerians in the United Kingdom.
This development has led to the mushrooming of dubious organizations, operating
as rackets, which claim to represent Nigerians in the UK. Nigerian government
officials routinely invite these dubious organizations to the High Commission during
visits. The groups are silent about the poor representation and services
provided by the High Commission.
A clear instance of the administrative decrepitude afflicting the High
Commission could be seen in the leadership vacuum created by the acting High
Commissioner, Mr. Ogah. Mr. Ogah left London for Abuja between December 12 and
22, 2016, leaving Mr. Hassan M. Hassan to run the Commission as Acting High
Commissioner. Mr. Hassan was already scheduled to leave the Mission on December
14, 2016, to undergo ambassadorial screening and subsequent ambassadorial
posting. In the end, for the duration of Mr. Ogah’s absence and with the
departure of Mr. Hassan, there was no officer duly authorized to run the
Mission. More bizarrely, there was no circular to the effect that Mr. Hassan
had been appointed acting High Commissioner, a clear contravention of Foreign
Affairs rules and regulations, which state that a mission must not be left
without a properly designated head at any time.
SAHARAREPORTERS
SAHARAREPORTERS
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