FORMER Chairman of the Pension Reforms Task Team (PRTT), Abdulrasheed Maina, has again made several corruption allegations against top serving officials of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration while maintaining his innocence in the charges brought against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Maina has been underground since October 2017 when Buhari ordered his dismissal from the federal civil service, but he has consistently maintained his innocence and claimed that he was being hunted by powerful forces in the administration who wants to kill him in order to protect their ugly secrets.
He was secretly reinstated into office after having been removed in 2010 by then President Goodluck Jonathan, following allegations of stealing of pension funds. But following public outcry, Buhari ordered that he be dismissed again.
The EFCC had also declared Maina wanted in connection with the above allegations. He was charged to court alongside Steven Oronsanye, a former Head of Service of the Federation, and other suspects. The others had pleaded not guilty to the charges but Maina has been on the run and has never attended any of the court sittings, much less enter a plea.
Since October 2017, Maina has granted several television interviews from his hiding place, detailing how he helped the federal government recover trillions of naira stolen by top public officials and urging Buhari to grant him an audience to prove his innocence.
Speaking during an interview on “Brekete Family”, a reality talk magazine programme that usually airs on Human Rights Radio, 101.1 FM, Abuja, on Friday, Maina reiterated his readiness to come out of hiding only if President Buhari would assure him of total protection. He said “the cabal” is earnestly searching for him and that his sources told him he would be “injected” once he comes out in the open.
Allegations against top government officials
Maina claimed that the current Head of Service of the Federation, Winifred Oyo-Ita, still operates bank accounts that are not linked to the Treasury Single Account of the federal government as directed by President Buhari, and that was why she worked against his reinstatement in 2017.
“There are accounts under her now, now, that she has not turned in to the single treasury account as directed by the President. Let her say no and then I will go back… I challenge her, I challenge everybody there. This is why they don’t want me to come back to my office,” he said.
Maina said he was willing to disclose to President Buhari all the clandestine accounts being operated by all his ministers.
He said: “President Buhari, I want you to open your eyes and ears, there is a lot of money in your government.
“All your ministers, I can give you the accounts of what they have operated, who is doing what, and where the monies have gone to. I can show you on the system.
“NFIU (National Financial Intelligence Unit) I challenge you to do your work. Give the chairman of EFCC the correct information let him give it to the President.”
Promise to recover trillions more
Maina promised that once he is assured of full protection by President Buhari, he would recover trillions from several hidden bank accounts owned and operated by government officials.
“The monies are there, they are in those accounts,” he said. “Let me tell you what they do. Sometimes they move them offshore. The accounts are there, they have been opened s many years ago.
“You know what they do, they call it accounting engineering. If at the end of the year, let’s say N200 billion is remaining in this ministry, the ministry, in collaboration with the office of the Accountant General of the Federation and return N20 billion and N198 billion is there. In this N198 billion, somebody will retire, and the new Permanent Secretary will not even know.
“So he (the retired official) will now sit down with the banks and do investments with the banks and for so many years, until he dies, nobody will know, and the banks will keep quiet.
“Such accounts exist in Nigeria, so many of them, and I have these accounts, I know them (but) nobody wants to give me the opportunity.”
Continuing, Maina said without checking through the many hidden accounts, several trillions would be recovered in the pension sector alone.
“I only touched two pension offices out of 98 pension outfits, and I brought (in) N2.9 trillion, only two pension offices.
On how long it would take him to recover the funds should President assure him of his safety, Maina said: “In the first week, I can recover N1 trillion for him. In the second month, I can recover N2 trillion for him, in the third month, I can recover another N1 trillion for him, but I have to have 100 per cent full protection from the President and I must not report to any other authority except the President.”
They are after my life
“Nigeria has a lot of money but the cabal is after my life. If they invite me to a meeting, they are not inviting me to talk to me, they are inviting me to kill me.
“I have people in these spy organisations who would tell me ‘look, you will be injected, we have already been advised to do such a thing’.
“They only want to get me out of this world, but if I go and allow myself to be killed, how will I impact on the lives of Nigerians?”
Maina also said Nigerians should not believe what is being reported in the media about him because almost all the media organisations in the have been compromised.
“Do you know that one time they went to one hotel, Chopstick, and spent N500 million to editors and reporters on Maina, ‘go and spoil Maina’. Nigerians should not be fooled by what they hear from newspapers. You can go and pay for anything to want to come out,” he said.
I did not run, I am in Nigeria
Maina said that contrary to several reports that he fled the country, “I am in Nigeria, I just travelled for lesser Hajj, I have been in Nigeria for long, in my house.”
“If I did something let them come and arrest me. I didn’t do anything,” he said.
Maina also demanded that the federal government should pay him five per cent of the trillions that he already recovered for the government in accordance to the current whistle-blowing policy of the current administration.
Culled: ICIR
