Reports

Ex-naval Chief, Others In Trouble Over N62.8b ‘Fraud’

Published

8 years ago

May 24, 2017

Ex-naval officers and others have landed themselves in troubled, having been implicated in alleged diversion of fund.

They include seven officers, a retired Rear Admiral and five businessmen, who were alleged to have diverted the sum of N62.8billion belonging to the Navy.

The fraud was said to have occurred between 2013 and 2015 when Vice Admiral Usman Jibrin was the Chief of Naval Staff, The Nation learnt.

Out of the sum N155million was said to have been refunded to Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), by a former Naval Chief of Accounts.

The former chief of Naval Staff Usman Jibrin is facing trial over the $2.1billion arms deals. He is being investigated for the alleged diversion with his wife and some companies, which are believed to have been allegedly used to launder the funds.

According to a preliminary report on the investigation, the N62, 851,088, 500.04 was allegedly siphoned from two accounts belonging to the Navy.

The diverted funds were sourced from the Chief of Naval Staff Operations Account and Okogba Mark Naval Account.

EFCC detectives discovered that four cashiers in the Navy(Lieutenant/Sub-Lieutenant) were used to siphon funds from the two accounts into some companies in which Jibrin has interest.

While trying to exonerate himself from the crime the former chief of Naval Staff, Usman Jibrin wrote a letter to EFCC Chairman Magu, stating, the allegation is all about vendetta;

The letter said in part: “I regret to state that my life has been under threat by operatives of the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) since my retirement from active service of the Nigerian Navy on the 14 July 2015.

“This is sequel to the fact that some cabals are hiding under the executive orders of Mr. President to settle scores against me on the perceived injustice allegedly meted on them by the Nigerian Navy during my tenure as the Chief of the Naval Staff.

“I decided to put my thought in writing because of information made available to me from very reliable sources that plans have been concluded to plant incriminating evidence against me by operatives of the EFCC.

“This revelation has pushed me to the wall to speak out as I have observed that silence may not be golden after all in the face of some suspicious activities going around my properties by unknown elements.

“My life is at stake, my dignity is at stake, my integrity is at stake and my name is at stake. I respect the rule of law and detest injustice. Fairly minded officers and men of the Nigerian Navy and those in other Services who worked closely with me could attest to this assertion.

”Let me hastily state that the kernel of my letter to you is to draw your attention to the fact that I now have it on good authority that your organisation is being used by a cabal who are very uncomfortable with my freedom and threatened by my unblemished record as the former Chief of Naval Staff who fought them to a standstill in their illegal bunkering and oil theft.

“They have found your Commission as the right tool to bring me down at all cost. Of course, your organisation working in tandem with the directives issued by these cabals who have concluded plans to plant incriminating materials, including foreign currencies, arms and ammunition, in any or some of my premises/properties and then come up with a trump up charge of financial crime or treasonable felony or illegal possession of weapons/firearms against me.

“This latest machination is to satisfy the cabal that the commission has fulfilled its bidding as well as justify all the raids which failed to produce any expected result.

”It is imperative to state at this juncture that no one has accused me of corruption or at least I am not aware of any written petition against me alleging any wrongdoing in my capacity as the former Chief of Naval Staff.

“I believe that EFCC has a procedure for investigating allegations against any individual, which is mostly predicated on a written petition, which leads to investigation, culminating into invitation of the alleged offender or arrest as the case may be. Subsequently, such offender is charged before a court of competent jurisdiction.

“Ironically, EFCC has never disclosed to me if there is any petition against me or the subject matter of their investigation against me that necessitates the surprise unending searches on my properties. It is worth noting that EFCC has conducted searches on me in 8 locations without discovering incriminating evidence bordering on financial crimes.

“In most cases, my assets were destroyed in my absence without a single apology from the Commission or explanation as to why my properties were raided. In all eight (8) instances, no search warrants were produced before these raids were conducted; neither was I notified.

“Please find enclosed photographs of the series of raids on my premises and the destruction therein. When will the everlasting investigation, which commenced in July 2015, come to an end for me to have my peace in life after active service?

”Suffice it to quickly note that under my watch as Chief of Naval Staff, I arrested over 60 vessels carrying out oil theft and illegal bunkering between January 2014 and July 2015, while discharging my constitutional responsibilities and handed over same and their owners to EFCC for prosecution.

“However, to my utter consternation, many of these suspects have been released and without prosecution, except for two (2) being prosecuted as at February 2017.

“Could it be that the cabals which the EFCC under your watch is acting their script against me are also beneficiaries of the proceeds of the oil theft and illegal bunkering which I stopped.” He concluded.

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