FIJ
It is no longer news that the real reason behind the 10-day abduction of FIJ reporter Daniel Ojukwu by the Nigeria Police Force is his investigative report on financial mismanagement in the office of the senior special assistant to the president on SDGs (OSSAP-SDGs).
When the police picked Ojukwu on May 1, none of his colleagues, friends and family knew his whereabouts, as the they barred him from contacting anyone.
It wasn’t until May 3 that FIJ learned that Ojukwu, who had been reported missing in police stations the previous day, was being held at the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) in Panti, Lagos. FIJ also gathered that he was arrested by the Intelligence Response Team (IRT) of the Inspector General of Police.
FIJ would also learn that the arrest followed a petition by Muiz Banire, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), regarding FIJ’s November 2023 story detailing how Orelope-Adefulire, with two weeks left of Buhari’s administration, sent N147.1 million for the construction of classrooms and a skill acquisition centre to the account of Enseno Global Ventures (Enseno GV), an Abuja-based restaurant.
Following the release of Ojukwu a day after journalists and civil society actors protested at the Force Headquarters, the police said he would be arraigned upon the conclusion of their investigations.
But, is a journalist unearthing corruption the one the police should be arraigning? FIJ is offering help to the police by compiling a list of 10 people related to this case that the police must arraign before Ojukwu.
ADEJOKE ORELOPE-ADEFULIRE
As the head of the office that awarded the contract for the suspicious project, Orelope-Adefulire should be on the list.
Before FIJ’s reports went out, attempts were made to contact her office, including through the use of the Freedom of Information Act, but no response was received.
The FoI Act stipulates that “where a case of wrongful denial of access is established, the defaulting officer or institution commits an
offence and is liable on conviction to a fine of N500,000″.
But beyond this, and beyond the documents the police claimed were tendered by the complainants, the police should be conducting their own independent investigations into the questionable ‘execution’ of the project.
In an unbiased court, the claims that the school project was relocated elsewhere after they found that the soil in the original location could not take the buildings and that there was no space to build the primary school would be thrown out. How can a government office release N147.1m without first conducting soil testing or determining the availability of space for the project?
NKIRU EZEKWESILI, OWNER OF ENSENO GV RESTAURANT
When Ojukwu contacted Nkiru Ezekwesili, the owner of the Abuja-based restaurant Orelope-Adefulire’s office paid N147.1 million to for a block of classrooms and skill acquisition centre in Lagos State, she said she was not aware of such a contract.
One of the uncovered discrepancies showed that the restaurant did the construction projects before the federal government paid for it.
Also, as of 2023, it was found that the company was inactive, which meant the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) did not have its tax records. Since the company was registered in 2019, it was supposed to have three years of tax clearance before the government could award contracts to it. But FIJ found otherwise: the construction projects were completed in 2022, two years and six months after the company was registered and one year before the government paid for it!
HONOURABLE SAHEED AJETUNMOBI
In the course of the reportage, FIJ learned that one Honourable Saheed Ajetunmobi hired an architect identified as Akin Ajani to be involved in the construction projects.
Efforts to contact Honourable Ajetunmobi for comments on the identified discrepancies surrounding the contract were unsuccessful.
AKIN AJANI
It was Ajani who revealed that the buildings were moved from their original location to a new one because of soil and space-related issues.
But he refused to ascertain the qualification of the restaurant to embark on the construction project. He also did not disclose how much it cost to construct the buildings.
ADEBISI ABDULWASIU
The day after FIJ published the first report, Ezekwesili, who had initially denied knowledge of the contract, reached out, saying she was not the one who took the contract. She would then send the phone number of Adebisi Abdulwasiu, whom she revealed had taken the contract.
When FIJ was eventually able to reach Abdulwasiu after multiple attempts, he said he was unavailable and would get back to the reporter. But he never did. Well, perhaps he will tomorrow.
MUHAMMED MUSA BAGANA
