Colombian drug baron arrested in Lagos

The Citizen

THE National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) on Thursday announced the arrest of  a Colombian drug baron  and seven Nigerians who specialise in the production of methamphetamine in some parts of the country.
Chairman of NDLEA, Alhaji Ahmadu Giade ,also expressed concern over the health and security implication of illegal methamphetamine production in Nigeria.
Giade addressed journalists on the developments in the operations of the agency,
He said  three production factories were discovered in Lagos and Anambra States. Giade described the new wave of drug racketeering as sad and worrisome.
“Our investigation has shown that the Colombian methamphetamine production expert, Gonzelo Osorio a.k.a Fabian Arcila or Baez Benitez Milan, was invited to establish three clandestine laboratories on a $38,000 (about N6 million) weekly contract. This is sad and worrisome. It is a clarion call on stakeholders to pay priority attention on this dangerous twist in our nation’s drug trade,” he said.
Narcotics investigators have arrested seven Nigerian members of the criminal gang who are helping NDLEA in further investigations. The suspects are Gonzelo Osorio, Gabriel Onyebuchi Obi, Anthony Ebi, Olisa Cyprian Onyebuchukwu, Mickey Ezeokoli, Solomon Ogbonna and Chidi Alexandra Efeagwazi.
Twelve vehicles belonging to suspected members of the cartel have been confiscated. In addition, four houses have also been traced to the criminal group by the agency.
The undercover operation which led to the crackdown on the criminal gang, according to Giade, commenced in November 2011 when Gonzelo Osorio was contracted by a Nigerian drug syndicate to establish three methamphetamine production laboratories in different parts of the country.
He described the operation as one of the best coordinated in terms of duration, expertise and professionalism by the agency.
The first clandestine laboratory Gonzelo established was situated at Majek area of Ibeju Lekki Local Council Area of Lagos State, while another one was located in Nanka village in Nnewi area of Anambra State.
The criminal gang was in the process of establishing the third laboratory when NDLEA officers apprehended them.
“Gonzelo Osorio left Nigeria in December 2011 and returned in May, 2012 with a false identity as a citizen of Paraguay with the name Baez Benitez Milan on his travel documents. He is regarded as the best methamphetamine production experts in their country and was hired on $38, 000  weekly by the drug cartel,” Giade said.
While the operation was ongoing, a suspect was apprehended in Lagos for using his residence for a personal production of methamphetamine. The reality of the threat, according to the agency, is that it is both a syndicate and a one-man affair.
“The concerted efforts of stakeholders are required. The suspects involved in the criminal act are either ignorant of the lethal health consequences of their action or have simply been blinded by their selfish interests. Methamphetamine production endangers public health. More worrisome is the security implication due to the huge profit involved,” Giade added.
It should be recalled that the first clandestine laboratory was discovered in June 2011 in Lagos. The second laboratory which was discovered in Lagos early this year, revealed the engagement of foreigners by local drug cells as three Bolivian expatriates who were running the laboratory were arrested and are currently undergoing trial.
In all, five production factories have been located by the agency.
Methamphetamine laboratories, according to experts, pose a serious health danger to the society. The risk of infection is also very high even after several years of abandonment. The chemicals and the gasses emitted during production are highly injurious. Even residents living close to a production area are at risk.

N4 Billion fraud: EFCC declares ex-Gov Audu wanted

The Citizen

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on Thursday declared former governor of Kogi State, Abubakar Audu wanted.
EFCC wants him to answer for offences bordering on conspiracy, stealing and misappropriation of public fund.

According to a press statement signed by the EFCC’s The EFCC’s action  followed the failure of the suspect to respond to invitation by the anti- graft agency said in a statement by its                                                          .spokesman  Mr, Wilson Uwajeran.
The statement said attempts by the EFCC to arrest Mr Audu at his 32, Sulaiman Barau Street, Asokoro, Abuja residence on December 11, 2012 failed as he allegedly evaded arrest.
The former governor is alleged to have fraudulently enriched himself to the tune of over N4 billion while he held sway as governor of Kogi State between 1999 and 2003.
The move to arrest the ex- governor followed a Supreme Court ruling of November 23, 2012, which dismissed the ex-governor’s appeal to continue to protract his corruption trial by EFCC.
The Commission implores anyone having useful information about the whereabouts of the suspect to notify its offices in Abuja, Port Harcourt, Lagos, Kano and Enugu or report at the nearest police station.

We are after N3.3tr stolen pension fund- Maina

The Citizen

The Head of Presidential Task Force on Federal Pension Disbursement, Abdulrasheed Maina, has said that forensic audit has uncovered the sum of N3.3 trillion pension fund stolen by cabals in various government agencies.
Fielding questions from State House correspondents, Maina who refused to mention the agencies and individuals involved so as not to jeopardize ongoing investigation, said in the next couple of days the names would be made public having received the nod of the federal government to do so.
“I want to tell you that what we have uncovered will surprise Nigerians. We have found that pension fund up to N3.3 trillion was stolen by the cabal and we are going to recover all the money,” he said.
Maina who regretted that the hunter has become the hunted following what he termed “biased” probe by the Senate Joint Committee on Establishment and Public Service, wondered how a task force that recovered about N241 billion as at October this year and has deleted 73,000 ghost pensioners from the civil service list, is being bullied and blackmailed rather than being commended, assured this has only strengthen the committee’s resolve to do more.
According to him, “N74 billion of the N181 billion discovered and saved by the pension task team has so far been mopped up for utilization in the 2012 budget,” he said.
“The Task Team has established E-Pension Management System (E-Pms) Platform, pioneered the payment of pensioners in Diaspora, introduced smart cards to eliminate physical verification of pensioners, traced and cracked down on pension cartel, simplify the processing period of getting pension entitlements down to 24 hours, discovered a total of 50,000 unpaid pensioners and paid them all their entitlements, stopped monthly stealing of N.25 billion from the Head of Service of the Federation Pension Office, cutting off N1 billion Police pension monthly release of N1.59 billion to N500 million instead and caused th arrest and prosecution of pension suspects.
“The team has also converted over 128,000 hard copies of pensioner’s file into electronic format, seized properties worth billions and cut off the pensioners verification annual expenditure of over N40 billion.
He said “the Senate Joint Committee on Establishment and Public Service is unfair to us because they have taken sides with the cabal against those of us that are fighting the corruption in the system.
“That is why I wrote a protest letter to the Senate President to complain how the committee is biased. They don’t allow us to answer questions because they will insist on a yes or no answer and that is unfair.”
Maina denied knowledge of the alleged theft of N195 billion by the pension office saying “we have been doing all this work without running cost and we don’t even have money to buy some basic office items like printing paper and toner. The records are there for all to see”.
He added, ” the Pension Task Team does not control or approve the utilization of the finances of the aforementioned pension offices (Military, Police, DSS, CIPPO and the Head of Service Pension Offices from 2005-2010), and for this reason, it could not have been possible for anybody to hold the team accountable for an allegedly missing funds by other pension offices to which the team has no control over.

SEC shuts down phoney fund manager

The Citizen

The office of the alleged illegal fund manager, Avenues to Wealth ,   was Tuesday sealed off by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), after several months of complaints by subscriber to the fund.
It took a combined team of both plain and uniformed police officers from both the commission and the Oduduwa Police Command Headquarters in Ikeja, stormed the premises on Tuesday and sealed off.
The office is  located within the serene Olufunmilola Okikolu Street, off Toyin Street Ikeja, Lagos.
The operation was led by the Assistant Director, Enforcement and Compliance, SEC, Mr. Benard Ebe.
The SEC’s move saw four top officials of the fund managers, including the Managing Director, Mr. Adeolu Akinyemi, being taken into custody at the Area ‘F’ Police Command.
Ebe added: “Three month ago details of the operations of the company came to the Commission. Section 153 of the Investment and Security Act (ISA) showed that operators of such fund must obtain license, to ensure close monitoring by the commission and more so, they are expected to file returns to the commission.”
He said that for any entity to engage in fund management, such organisation must register its operations with the commission while anything short of this would amount to illegality.
Other schemes engaged in by the fund managers include network signup vouchers, estate rentals, real estate, retail supermarket, electronics, IT gadgets,  fund cooperative, travels and telecom.
“They lure people to bring their money to them and in the process they pay dividend or interest as the case may be. From there they pay the initial investors in the scheme, but when the investors have brought a lot other investors on board of the scheme, they will short their premises their making several investors losing million of naira.
A pamphlet from the organization showed that showed thatthe fund projected  a yield on investment  at an average of 20 per cent per annum with a 5 year capital holding.
The commission moves which saw four top officials of the fund managers, including the Managing Director, Mr. Adeolu Akinyemi being taken into custody at the Area ‘F’ Police command, said “Three month ago details operation of the company came to the commission, Section 153 of the Investment and Security Act showed that operators of such fund must obtained license, to ensure close monitoring by the commission and moreso they are expected to file returns to the commission.
However, one of the officials who claimed to be advisor to Avenue to Wealth, but who did not disclose his name, said their operation was registered with the Lagos State Ministry of Agriculture as a Corporative Society.

Pension Scam: Another N20 billion secret account discovered

The Citizen

The chairman, Pension Reform Task Team, Dr. Abdulrasheed Maina, has said that his committee has found another N20 billion in stolen pension funds stashed in a secret account.
Maina while speaking during an interview with journalists in Abuja, said the funds were hidden in some dormant accounts in some banks but said no reports have been made to the authorities concerned because investigations are still ongoing.
His words: “Recently, we discovered some money hidden in other accounts, apart from the N221 billion we have recovered and sent to the government.
“I did not disclose this earlier because we are still under investigation. The money is over N20 billion.
“The amount has been hidden in some accounts that are dormant for over three years… As soon as we get through with our investigation, we will report to the Minister of Finance to instruct the Accountant-General to move the money” he said.

We’ll recover missing N195bn pension fund –Reform team

The Citizen

The Pension Reform Task Team has offered to assist the Senate to recover the alleged N195bn missing pension funds.
Also, the Chairman of the team, Dr. Abdulrasheed Maina, said the panel had apart from the N221bn recovered from pension fund thieves, discovered a new secret account with well over N20bn.
Maina, who said this in an interview with newsmen in Abuja on Friday, explained that the team had the know-how to recover such  hidden funds.
He said, “We, as task team, are interested in working with the Senate to recover the N195bn because we have the expertise and technical knowledge to go after the fund and recover it.
“If it is in people’s account, we will recover it and if people stole it, we will find it out. We have a track record of doing that.”
He added, “Recently, we discovered that some amount of money are hidden in other accounts apart from the N221bn we sent to the government. I have not said this before because we are still under investigation.  It is over N20bn.
“This money has been hidden in some accounts that are dormant for over three years. As soon as we get through with our investigation, we will report to the Minister of Finance to instruct the Accountant-General to move the money to Central Bank where a special account is opened for such money.”
The Chairman expressed sadness that the Senate Joint Committee on Establishment and  Public Service and States and Local Governments Administration, was being misled into maligning the task team.
He said, “Our detractors thought we have an account and we are keeping money. We only go to the bank, see account balance and write what we have observed. We have all the security agencies in our midst.
“We have this coordination but people don’t know. They give false information to the Senate Committee and they sit down on false information without verifying.
“If you are given an assignment as a committee, I feel the first person you will look for is the person in charge of the team.
“We are the depository of the database of the civil service, we ought to have been invited first so that we can go round the country with the committee investigating management of pension fund but nobody invited us.”
He added that people within the system who were feeding fat through the loopholes were those fighting hard to ensure that the team was discredited and the status quo remained.
“They want to distract us. It is not about anything but corruption fighting back,” he said.

Court orders AMCON to reopen Capital Oil

The Citizen

Court on Wednesday granted the prayers of Capital Oil and Gas Industries Ltd for the vacation of an order which allowed the Asset Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON) to shut down the oil firm’s facilities since November 13, 2012.
Federal High Court, Abuja Division  discharged the order it granted to freeze the properties of the embattled owner of Capital Oil and Gas Industries Limited, Ifeanyi Ubah.
In setting aside the order, Justice Abdul Kafarati ruled that the court has the powers to set aside its orders especially when justice demands it does so.
He added that Capital Oil was an on-going concern when it was shut down and the business of AMCON is not to stifle businesses.
Justice Kafarati ordered AMCON to reopen the facilities while it retains the title deeds of the facilities and also enter into negotiation with the company on how to pay the debt.
The Judge had on November 13, ordered AMCON to take immediate possession of properties and assets of Capital Oil and Gas Industries Limited, following allegation that the oil firm is indebted to AMCON to the tune of N48.014 billion.
Capital Oil re-approached the High Court on November 22, and asked it to vacate the interim order.
Meanwhile an attempt by AMCON to get the court’s order to sell off proceeds stored in the company’s facility and an order as to where the money will be retained hit a brick wall.
Counsel to AMCON, Mr Ricky Tarfa standing on Order 28 of the court rules, asked the court to order the sales of products held in the capital oil storage facilities, he further asked that proceeds of the sale be held in an account as ordered by the court pending the determination of the owners of the fund.
Rejecting the oral application, counsel to Capital Oil told the court that such an application must come formally and besides that, products in the Capital Oil facility belong to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
Justice Kafarati ordered AMCON to bring a formal application as a result of the many interests on the products and adjourned the suit to the 15th of January 2013 for definite hearing.