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July 9, 2023
Former Zamfara State Governor, Abdulaziz Yari, has regained his freedom following his detention by Nigeria’s secret police, the Department of State Services (DSS).
SaharaReporters learnt on Sunday morning that Yari regained his freedom on Saturday night.
SaharaReporters had exclusively reported that the DSS detained the former governor and serving senator, Yari, over N45 billion reelection fund released under former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.
Authoritative sources told SaharaReporters that Yari was implicated by the detained governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, who alleged that the former governor received N45 billion from the CBN to fund Buhari’s reelection in 2019.
Emefiele has been detained by the DSS since the second week of June after his suspension by President Bola Tinubu’s government which is investigating him for “corruption-related issues and abuse of office.”
SaharaReporters had reported how Emefiele also named the suspended head of the anti-corruption agency Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Abdulrasheed Bawa, as an alleged accomplice in the Naira redesign scam which rocked the country months ago.
During the inauguration of the 10th National Assembly, Yari had remained “adamant” despite the zoning of the Senate Presidency to the South-South the ruling All Progressives Congress and contested against Godswill Akpabio – the current Senate President who is also Tinubu’s stooge.
Yari was the favoured candidate of the Buhari cabal to clinch the Senate Presidency but he lost to Akpabio who got 63 votes.
Sources told SaharaReporters on Saturday that both Emefiele and Bawa implicated Yari, and the DSS had to come after him.
“DSS agents have been tracking him (Yari) since returning from London for medical care soon as he lost the Senate Presidency. The detained EFCC Chair Bawa also implicated Yari in a detailed manner regarding how Yari was doing deals with Emefiele. Emefiele in turn accused Bawa of working for Yari,” one of the sources had said.
SaharaReporters on June 17 reported that Yari lobbied the leaders of opposition political parties and spent billions of Naira on his aspiration.
Sources said that the former governor was betrayed by the “leadership of some opposition parties.”
SaharaReporters also in August 2022 reported how details emerged on how Yari together with the suspended Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF), Ahmed Idris pilfered about N8 billion and $2.2 billion from nine oil-rich states.
On how Idris, Yari and others illegally shared N84.7 billion, an EFCC official had said, “We found out that there was an agitation by nine oil-producing states on the depletion of the excess crude account without the payment of their 13 per cent derivation fund.
“This agitation was tabled before the post-mortem sub-committee of the Federal Account Allocation Committee, FAAC. It was further revealed that the post-mortem sub-committee came up with a figure of about $2.2 billion as what was due to these nine states.
“This amount was to be deducted over a 16 months period, on a quarterly basis. 11.5 per cent of this figure, which is equivalent to N84.7 billion, was put aside for the payment of some public officials to facilitate this payment.
“Even after the determination of this amount by the post-mortem sub-committee, the service of Olusegun Akindele and Co. Ltd, a company belonging to the 2nd defendant, was procured under the guise of consultancy.
“N84.7 billion, which is 11.5 per cent, was paid to Akindele Olusegun and Co. through First Bank Plc. The sum of N84.39 billion equivalent to 9.84 per cent less bank charges, was what was shared among the various parties.
“We wrote a letter to First Bank Plc to get the statement of account of the company. From the statement of account, we found out that the first payment was on February 12, 2021. There was an accumulative payment of over N21 billion.
“Before the payment was made, the balance on the account was N451, 631 and the source of the payment was from FAAC’s Escrow account. Investigation revealed that this account was under the control of the 1st defendant (Idris) and the 3rd defendant (Usman) who was the director of the federation account in the office of the AGF.
“Aside from this payment on February 12, 2021, my lord, similar payment of the same amount of over N21 billion were made on May 6, July 28 and November 5, 2021, bringing it to a total of about N84.39 billion.”