December 9, 2009
The report of the $3.1 million money laundering involving the Akwa Ibom State Governor, Chief Godswill AKpabio, has created sharp division and suspicion within the state cabinet.
Mrs. Emem Etuk, a Deputy General Manager, Victoria Island Branch (3) of Platinum Habib Bank (BankPHB) was arrested on 11 November 2009 by security operatives at the General Aviation Terminal of the Murtala Muhammed Airport, Lagos with $3.1 million suspected to belong to the Akwa Ibom State Governor.
Mrs. Etuk’s inability to offer plausible explanation as to how she came about the money or her mission let to the escalation of the case to the police force headquarters, Abuja after she had been detained in Lagos for two weeks.
Details of the financial scandal were unknown until the SaharaReporters’ revelation early in the week.
Following the revelation, the governor’s agent, one Centre for Media and Development has issued a statement defending the governor and dismissing the link between the scam and the governor. The Magnus Eze-led group assumed the role of the police and the court by submitting that investigations by the group exonerated the governor and that the money was meant for 2009 hajj pilgrims.
SaharaReporters can reveal however that whereas airlift of pilgrims started on 25 October, by 11 November when Mrs. Etuk was arrested, most pilgrims had departed and all travel plans had been concluded.
Sources in government house, Uyo revealed that the Governor, who became disturbed about how the matter became a media discourse after his success in suppressing the incident for four weeks after occurrence, had ordered a secret investigation to unravel those who leaked the information to the press.
According to the sources, the feeling in government circles was that insiders of the governor’s kitchen cabinet might have leaked the $3.1 million deal. The state commissioner for works and transport, Mr. Don Etim, told newsmen on Wednesday that the governor was innocent and that the report linking the governor to the scam was the handiwork of his political opponents.
The commissioner failed to explain the relationship between Mrs. Etuk and the governor. He also did not deny the fact of huge lodgement by the state in the bank with Mrs. Etuk as the account officer.
Despite the public outcry and call for immediate investigation by anti-graft agencies, the spokesman for the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mr. Femi Babafemi, said the matter was a police affair and the EFCC would not ‘meddle’ in it.
The police, on the other hand, have refused to make any public statement on the incident concerning their findings. Efforts to get the force police public relations officer, Mr. Emmanuel Ojukwu were abortive. He would not pick his calls neither would he respond to text messages.
But the bank authorities confirmed the arrest and the huge sum involved. They however insisted that Mrs. Etuk was acting on official capacity, failing however to address earlier report that the bank had a day before the arrest transferred funds meant to Abuja through the designated persons and with appropriate authorisation.
The bank also claimed to have produced relevant documents to the police to secure Mrs. Etuk’s release recovery of the money. But security operatives at the airport insist that no such documents accompanied Mrs. Etuk at the time of her arrest and that the document being referred to by the bank must be an afterthought.
A top manager in the bank explained who pleaded not to be named noted that the damage-control action of the bank was to save it from the big hammer of the Sanusi Lamido Sanusi-led Central Bank of Nigeria and to save the bank from image crisis.
The bank management also feared that the governor might move the state’s account and lodgement from the bank which would be a death blow at this time of low deposit and financial meltdown.
A source in government house, Uyo who pleaded not to be named noted that the arrest of Mrs. Etuk was a grand plot by those opposed to the governor’s ‘mismanagement’ to bring his activities to public domain. He claimed preliminary investigations by the government house showed that the airport security officials were tipped off.
“It is not the first time any agent will be doing this deal for politicians and not just our governor, but this is a plot by insiders and we shall get to the root,” he said. He denied knowledge of likely complicity of Mrs. Etuk’s husband who is the governor’s special assistant on utilities.
Mr. Etuk was also reported to have distanced himself from the report insisting that he could not have done what would cost him and his wife their jobs. But it was suspected that he might have mentioned the fund transfer arrangement to some of the governor’s confidant innocently and to win the favour of the inner circle of the cabinet.
The source noted that some members of the kitchen cabinet were bent on severing the relationship between the governor and some of his friends described as outsiders. According to the source, the said outsiders were being favoured with huge contracts and other patronages at the expense of the cabinet members and the people of the state.
For instance, they had raised query on the relationship between the governor and former Managing Director of the defunct Daily Times, Mr. Yemi Ogunbiyi whom is said to have won a contract of N3 billion to supply exercise books to state schools.
They also are not comfortable with Mr. Sylvester Okoronkowo, Mr. Ben Bruce of Silverbird, Mr. Franco Facioni of ALCON Nigeria Limited, Julius Berger PLC, Prince Tokunbo Sijuwade, son of the Ooni of Ife in Osun State among others whom they describe as the conduit through which the governor siphons state funds.
They dismissed insinuations that the governor of Akpabio was set to empower only his kith and kin from the Annang stock. According to the sources, only members of the governor’s immediate family and his personal allies manage contracts and state funds.
One of the grouses against the governor is the alleged insistence that all contractors should patronise his younger brother, Nsetip Akpabio to supply building materials and that the same Nsetip should drill boreholes in the security villages in the local governments of the state.
The security villages consist of houses for the police chiefs and heads of the state security services in all the local governments. The idea, it was gathered is to secure the support of the security agencies toward the second term bid of the governor.
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('comments'); });
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content1'); });
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content2'); });