The suspended Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Ibrahim Magu, has revealed that the commission distributed vehicles and other properties forfeited to the federal government to the State House and other federal agencies instead of auctioning them and lodging the proceeds in the federation account where it would be shared by all the federating units of the country.
Magu made this revelation while responding to an allegation that he converted some assets forfeited to the government for personal enrichment.
Allegations of corruption and insubordination were levelled against him by the Attorney-General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami but Magu denied most of the allegations.
Following his arrest, allegations that Magu diverted billions of naira gotten from recovered funds, as well as the interests accrued from the funds, were circulated and published on various media platforms.
Magu, however, told the Mr Salami led probe panel in a letter the allegation that he enriched himself with forfeited assets was “totally false, untrue and merely targeted at destroying my hard-earned reputation as an incorruptible officer.”
He wrote:
Since my assumption of office as the Ag. Chairman of the Commission, not a single recovered or forfeited property has been sold and the proceeds fraudulently converted.
He said all properties finally forfeited to the government were intact except those that secured presidential approval for allocation to some government agencies.
Of all the properties he said only the proceeds of 244 trucks, which were sold on the orders of the Federal High Court in conjunction with the Department Petroleum Resources (DPR) were remitted to the recovery account domiciled with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
According to Mr Magu, properties that were distributed with the approval of President Buhari includes vehicles given to the ministry of humanitarian affairs and disaster management. The value price of these vehicles was deducted from the ministry’s allocation.
He also claimed the State House, National Commission for Refugees and Displaced Persons and Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) were allocated some of the vehicles.
Federal agencies who received real estate properties permanently forfeited to the federal government were the Voice of Nigeria (VON), National Directorate of Employment (NDE), Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, North-East Development Commission and Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD), Magu said.
Meanwhile, properties which were under interim forfeiture to the government were also ‘rented” to the Nigeria Army, Federal Ministry of Finance, Fiscal Responsibility Commission, Nigeria in Diaspora Commission, and the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria.
He said the Nigeria National Human Rights Commission and the National Council for Arts and Culture “have also approached the commission to rent some properties that were under interim forfeiture.” He, however, did not explain who collects the rent.