The Nation Newspaper

Tag: ‘suspicious’

  • Badoo: ‘Church leaders must reject suspicious money’

    Lagos cleric, Prophet Lai Bamidele, has said most church leaders in the country “suffer integrity deficit.”

    Bamidele, who is General Overseer of Glorious End-Time Evangelical Ministries, a church with headquarters in Oko-Oba, Lagos, said if the churches had been playing their roles effectively, criminal activities would have abated.

    Bamidele said the recent Badoo ritual killing syndicate in Ikorodu, was clear evidence that most men of God often looked the other way when rich, ritual killers give huge sums of money to church without defined jobs.

    He said: “While many other factors contribute to crime, I am of the belief that many men of God in this country are liable in the way they encourage people of shady character to bring money, without bothering to find who such persons are. Integrity is the hallmark of success in life. The leader we are having in this country today lack integrity.

    “It has also entered into churches. Pastors don’t preach righteousness again; they do not speak holiness again. Pastors only preach prosperity. When they bring money, you don’t ask them where they got the money from. You will say ‘God has blessed the church’ and that is why the church is polluted today.

    “There is no more truth in the church; even if it is blood money, as long as it is fat, you will collect it. Until the church of God starts saying the truth, we are going nowhere as a nation.”

  • Okonjo-Iweala named in N1.17b ‘suspicious’ transfer

    Okonjo-Iweala named in N1.17b ‘suspicious’ transfer

    Reps probe how ex-minister dumped Jonathan’s directive

    A House of Representatives ad hoc committee is probing the “suspicious” transfer to another account of N1.17bilion approved for a Federal Government agency.

    The committee is seeking answers to why the immediate past Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, reversed a presidential directive which approved the money for the Sokoto Rima River Basin Development Authority (SRRBA).

    Besides, the committee is seeking to establish:

    • Who applied for the withdrawal since payment was initiated through an application by the SRRBDA?
    • How a ministerial directive can override a presidential approval;
    • Where the money was returned to after it was withdrawn from the account of the Authority; and
    • Whether the withdrawal was politically motivated given the time of the withdrawal

    The committee has hinted of the likelihood of inviting the ex-minister.

    Mrs Okonjo-Iweala is at the centre of a storm over her release of $330m Abacha loot to the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), without appropriation. The money, which she said was meant as a loan for arms procurement, later turned out to be part of the cash being shred to politicians and friends of that government before the last general election.

    President Goodluck Jonathan, in a letter, approved the release of the money to the River Basin Authority. The approval was conveyed to the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF) by the (then) minister of Finance, according to the office of the AGF.

    The payment was made into the accounts of the SRRBDA on March 9 but withdrawn in two tranches within a week, two months later in May.

    The first withdrawal of N784m was made on 6th May, 2015. The second, N90m, was effected on 12th May 2015 but executed on 16th May 2015 by the CBN.

    Only N874.6million was withdrawn by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) from the account of SRRBDA because the agency had started spending the money.

    The investigative hearing by the ad hoc committee was told how the CBN credited and reversed the payment on the directives of the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF).

    The Committee, it was learnt, would request from the CBN records of tranfer and reversal of the money from the Natural Resources account and other accounts.

    SRRBDA’s Managing Director (MD) Mukhtar Anka said the agency made an appeal to (then) President Jonathan, knowing that the agency had some outstanding funds with the Federal government, “Because all our previous budgets were never fully released since 2012.

    “We could no longer meet our projects and contractual obligations while our contractors were bothering us.That was why we made the appeal,” he said.

    The representative of the CBN, Suleman Barau, told the committee that the bank carried out its duties based on approved and duly-signed mandates from the OAGF, who owns all accounts of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA).

    Mr. M Dikwa, Director, Funds, who represented the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), Ahmed Idris, said the reversal of the fund was carried out through a ministerial memoranda, unlike the approval that was effected through a presidential approval.

    He also disclosed that the OAGF will recover the balance from the SRRBDA when there is enough money in its account since it had already spent out of it.

    When the Committee asked the AGF why the withdrawals were made, Dikwa said some discrepancies were discovered after the payment.

    He said the one-page approval letter had no attachment detailing the purpose of the funds. It was also discovered that the Federal Government had already paid the said amount by way of budgetary allocations.

    The committee wondered if the reversal was politically-motivated, considering the period of reversal and the 2015 general elections.

    The Evelyn Oboro-led Committee regretted that many of such payments may have been made by the AGF in the past only to claim to have made new discoveries later.

    When the committee asked the AGF to produce the application for the withdrawal, the AGF could not produce any.

    Also, the AGF had no response when asked by the committee to justify effecting the withdrawal with a ministerial directive while the approval for payment was by a presidential directive .

    The committee faulted the AGF for failing to conduct needs assessment and due diligence before effecting payment of funds to MDAs.

    Oboro said: “Conduct of post mortem after payments does not seem to promote transparency and accountability.

    “We are interested in who applied for the withdrawal since payment was initiated through an application by the SRRBDA.

    “More importantly, there is a need to know how a ministerial directive can override a presidential approval.

    “We also want to know where the money was returned to after it was withdrawn from the account of the Authority.

    “We are only interested in how to make agencies of government can be responsive to the people.

    “This is an organisation that can bring a whole lot to the agricultural sector in that region and the country as a whole, yet through whatever what we are yet to understand, it was being deliberately starved of funds. We are determined to get to the bottom of the matter.”

    The investigation continues.

  • ‘Suspicious package’ found in Westfield mall

    Westfield Shopping Centre was evacuated after a suspicious package was found on tuesday.

    Staff and shoppers were told to leave the retail hub in Stratford with pictures posted on Twitter showing throngs of people waiting outside.

    Westfield is one of the country’s biggest shopping centres and the evacuation came days after Luton Airport was evacuated because of a bomb scare.

    The Metropolitan Police confirmed the evacuation but an hour after it the situation was “stood down”.

    Thousands of staff and shoppers were told to leave the retail hub in Stratford.

    A spokeswoman said: “The incident has now been stood down.

    “We were dealing with a suspicious package at the shopping centre. We were called at about 12.10pm.

    “The shopping centre was evacuated at about 13.45 and the incident was stood down at 14.54.

    “It is no longer deemed to be suspicious.”

    The Metropolitan Police later stood down the situation.

    Last month the UK terror threat was raised to “severe” meaning a terrorist attack is highly likely.

    After the evacuation people took to Twitter to post pictures and speculate about what caused it.

    Twitter user Miguel Ausina photographed people leaving Westfield and wrote: “Westfield Stratford being evacuated due to possible bomb scare.”

    Peter Jarvis added: “Westfield Stratford evacuated until further notice. Unknown hidden mystery device found.”

    Some of the pictures show thousands of people standing outside on the street, while police officers stand guard.

     

  • CBN warns mobile money operators against ‘suspicious’ transactions

    The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has listed transactions that will be categorised as suspicious in the mobile money business.

    In a paper entitled: Regulatory framework for mobile payment services in Nigeria, CBN said a mobile payment firm would be involved in suspicious transactions when it allows a single mobile account (individual) to receive a total volume of payments of more than 100 in a day.

    Also, any mobile payment (individual) that receives a total volume of payments of more than N1,000 in a day; and when any mobile payment (merchant) account that receives a total value of payments of N10 million and above in a day will be involved in ‘suspicious’ deals.

    It said any company involved in suspicious transactions, has violated anti-money laundering regulations.

    CBN said it would be in the interest of a mobile payment company to disclose such transactions to avoid problems.

    “The mobile payments scheme operator shall notify the Nigerian Intelligence Financial Unit (NFIU) of suspicious transactions as part of anti-money laundering regulations provided by CBN,”the report added.

    It said the regulatory authorities have the right to change the criteria for suspicious transactions reporting on mobile payments as it deemed fit, adding that such amendments shall be communicated by appropriate channels to the mobile payment operators among other stakeholders.

    It said: “CBN would ensure that appropriate processes and procedures are established for the purpose of monitoring compliance to the regulatory framework. Non-compliance with the provisions of the regulatory framework shall attract appropriate sanctions as may be determined by the Central Bank of Nigeria.”

    It said CBN will establish the Office of Ombudsman, noting that the Office would consist of the representative of the Nigerian Communications Commission; Consumer Protection Council; Scheme Operators; Financial Institutions; and a member of National Payments System Committee to foster the growth of electronic payment system in Nigeria.

    In a related development, a Deputy Director, CBN, Mr Emmanuel Obaigbona, said there is the need to do more enlightenment in view of the high rate of electronic payment fraud in the country.

    He said there is a need for customers to guide their identities to reduce fraud.

    Obaigbona, also the Chairman of Nigerian Electronic Fraud Forum (NeFF), said the forum is looking at the Payment System Management Bill put together by the legal working group of the Financial Sector Surveillance (FSS 20: 2020), before submission to the National Assembly.

    He said besides the awareness creation, the forum has produced a card arbitration framework for review and possible adoption by the industry stakeholders.

    He said the forum is committed to training, arguing that this is the only way to upscale knowledge among practitioners and further ensure that e-payment fraudsters do not rubbish the work done on the cash-less policy initiative.