In continuation of its onerous task of auditing arms and equipment purchased between 2007 and 2015, the 13-man Presidential Panel has begun a discreet tour of relevant military formations across the country.
New Telegraph gathered from highly placed military sources that the tour is aimed at undertaking physical verification of military hardware and equipment either bought or claimed to have been bought by senior retired and serving military officers.
One of the sources, who craved anonymity owing to the sensitive nature of the issue, said that the audit panel had visited one of the military formations in the South-West states.
According to the informed source, the physical assessment has so far revealed that some of the equipments are not in good condition. It was gathered that members of the committee are guarding their activities jealously, even as security around them is said to be impenetrable, against the backdrop of the class of Nigerians being probed.
“You know that members of the arms audit panel who are very distinguished and upright Nigerians have started moving out to some affected military formations to have on the spot evaluation and assessment of equipment, which were bought or claimed to have been bought.
“As a matter of fact, they have even visited some formations in the South-West and I think some of the things they saw have been cannibalised, not in good shape at all,” he said.
He explained that having been provided with documents and information regarding the purchase of arms and equipment between the period under review, the panel decided to move to the various formations where they are kept, for physical audit. New Telegraph had reported exclusively that the EFCC had traced about N17.5 billion to the banks’ accounts of wives of three air force chiefs.
The huge sums of money were kept in different bank accounts run by the wives of the affected officers. New Telegraph had also reported that huge amount of money had been traced to the accounts of children of some indicted serving and retired military officers.
Upon the submission of the panel’s second interim report and the recommendations therein, President Muhammadu Buhari had ordered the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to further investigate the immediate past Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Air Chief Marshal Alex Badeh (rtd) and two former Chiefs of Air Staff (CAS), Air Marshal MD Umar and Air Marshal Adesola Amosu, respectively.
Other serving and retired officers are Maj- Gen. E. R. Chioba (Rtd), AVM I. A. Balogun (Rtd), AVM A. G. Tsakr (Rtd), AVM A. G. Idowu (Rtd), AVM A. M. Mamu, AVM O. T. Oguntoyinbo, and AVM T. Omenyi. Also facing investigation are AVM J. B. Adigun, AVM R. A. Ojuawo, AVM J. A. Kayode-Beckley, Air Cdre S. A. Yushau (Rtd), Air Cdre A. O. Ogunjobi, Air Cdre G. M. D. Gwani, Air Cdre S. O. Makinde, Air Cdre A. Y. Lassa, Col N. Ashinze and Lt Col. M. S. Dasuki (Rtd).
A statement earlier issued by the Presidency had said that the audit panel discovered “nonspecification of procurement costs, absence of contract agreements, award of contracts beyond authorised thresholds, transfer of public funds for unidentified purposes and general non-adherence to provisions of the Public Procurement Act.”
It further noted that “the procurement processes were arbitrarily carried out and generally characterised by irregu-larities and fraud. In many cases, the procured items failed to meet the purposes they were procured for, especially the counter insurgency efforts in the North-East.”
Meanwhile, former Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Air Chief Marshall Alex Badeh (rtd), will today honour the invitation extended to him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in furtherance of investigations into procurement of arms under his watch.
Dependable source close to the former defence chief revealed to New Telegraph that Badeh got invitation on Monday and he has promptly directed his personal aides to make arrangements for his visit to the commission’s office by this morning as requested by the anti-graft agency. The former CDS will explain his role in the arms purchase for the military under his watch as the coordinating officer for the Armed Forces.
According to the source, Badeh has maintained a low profile in the face of recent allegation.
“While it is impossible to say any human is perfect, we believe some of the allegations as contained in the order directing EFCC to probe Badeh and others are particularly strange to those of us who worked with him,” one of the military sources said.
“We are even more curious because, we understand these officers were not invited for questioning by the presidential panel that conducted preliminary investigations into the matter. “Well, we are glad he now has an opportunity to defend his good name built over years of dedicated service to the nation,” the source said.
