The Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Public Safety and National Intelligence, Mr. Aminu Jaji, has revealed that the committee is investigating the $289 million approved for the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) under former President Goodluck Jonathan.
The committee, in the same vein, is investigating the allegations against the new NIA boss, Ahmed Rufai Abubakar.
Jaji, while fielding questions from newsmen in Abuja, spoke on the committee’s effort in investigating the agency.
According to him, “the most important thing is that there was $ 289 million approved by the agency. Then $43 million was discovered in Ikoyi, and another $44 million was discovered in their vault. If they procured or whatever they did, from there we can say they procured this and did this for so and so projects.”
On the $44 million that was reported missing from the agency’s vault, Jaji said: “We later discovered from our meeting since last week that the $44million is not missing. For that one, I can tell you they moved the money from one place to another.
“We are still investigating. If we get 60 to 70 percent of what we are supposed to get, then we can tell you. But for now, I will tell you categorically that the money is not missing. They only moved it from the agency to another place pending when all these issues surrounding the agency are resolved,” he stated.
He further stated that, “if you remember, this $44 million is part of the $289 million approved for the then DG, Ayo Oke. You know that in April last year, there was the issue of $43million found in Ikoyi. He tried to say that the $44million and the $43million are part of the $289million. But for us, we’re still working to see where the remaining $202million was placed. We only know about the $43million recovered in Ikoyi and the $44million recovered from their vault.
“In the course of our investigation, we’ll come up with where the $289million really is, not the $43million and not the $44million but the entire amount,” he stated.
On the new NIA boss, he said “there’s an investigation going on before the committee. We started the investigation last week. In the course of the investigation, we invited the immediate past acting DG of NIA. After that, we resolved to invite the present DG, NIA.
“Having interacted with him, we found out that already there are allegations against him in the social media, about his person and what have you. By and large, the issue of saying there are some directors in the agency that are protesting the appointment, as the chairman, we didn’t receive any information in this regard.
“We tried to find out from the DG and some staff working in the agency, and there’s no protest. For me, it’s just something anonymous, so there’s none,” he disclosed.