LOOTING MAYOR: NPHCDA BOSS EMBEZZLE NATION’S WEALTH TO HIMSELF BY AWARDING N337 MILLION INFLATED CONTRACTS TO CRONIES

A group, United Youths Alliance Against Corruption (UYAAC), has accused the Executive director of national primary health care development agency ), Dr. Faisal Shuaib, of unwholesome financial anomalies.

The group according to Abusidiqu, in a letter containing series of damning allegations against Dr. Shuaib, and addressed to President Muhammadu Buhari submitted that the purchase of operational vehicles in the 2016 financial year did not follow due process.

The group alleged that there was no advert for the contract and letter of award for the contract, which in both ways violates the laid down procedures guiding such jobs.

The letter partly reads:

1. It is also observed that the way and manner by which the purchases/payments were made indicates clear elements of contract splitting, this is clearly indicated is the vouchers attached. Payment was staggered into smaller payments into Stanbic Account Number 9200057983 belonging to Lanre Shittu. See Appendix 2a-2r.
2. The process by which the insurance company was selected and paid leaves much to be desired in the face of transparency, fairness and probity. From the preliminary outcome of our investigations we observed that the Head of Audit, Mr Ada Egahi brought the insurance company and influenced the inflation of the insurance cost from 15 million naira to over 40 million naira, on behalf of the Executive Director. The company’s financial transactions should be scrutinized to expose this. There was no advert for the procedure of selecting the insurance company which eventually handled the process. It is also observed that the said insurance company, Supreme Equitable Insurance Brokers Limited, submitted a quotation on the 04/05/2017 while approval and payment was made on the 05/05/2017, same for that of the car purchase. This payment was made to Skye Bank account number 1771681235. How come? See Appendix 3 and 4.
3. From our preliminary investigations we got to know that only one company submitted the three(3) quotations that were eventually used, with the successful company, Lanre Shittu Motors Limited,   being skewed to submit the least amount of Twenty-two million five hundred thousand naira per unit for 15 units making a total sum of Three hundred and thirty seven million five hundred thousand naira (N337,500,000.00) , but from our findings this was inflated as the SAME company in question gave a lesser figure for the same unit with a verbal promise that the cost could be significantly lowered if the number of purchased unit went up, which we were informed could come as low as Nineteen million five hundred thousand naira (N19,500,000). This we believe was the actual amount which was paid, while the balance was of Three million naira (3,000,000.00) was collected on behalf of the Executive Director by Idris Bello, a Deputy Director in the Human Resources department. We call for an indepth scrutiny of the accounts of all concerned to ascertain the culpability of alleged offenders. This is a clear case of wastage if not intended fraud, we thus call for a prompt recovery of this inflated monies. Our health centers need that money. This was with the approval given by the immediate past Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Health. Questions which we beg to be answered are:

• A provision of the complete list of project vehicles for 2016.
• If this was a direct purchase, since the transaction was made directly by the agency with the supplying company, and if the sum paid was appropriate or otherwise inflated going by the market price of the vehicle at around 19.5 million naira including taxes, because we suspect kick back proceeds were engineered for certain persons.
• Whether the urgency with which the transaction was made was because of inherent emergencies which they claimed it was for meningitis control or to deliberately expend available funds before the window for such expenditures was closed so as to engineer monetary benefits, which we suspect to be so as most of the purchased vehicles are lying idle at the office.

1. The Executive Director made an extra-budgetary purchase from funds of the agency by procuring a 33KVA generator at 6.7million naira for his personal use, being fully aware this wasn’t part of the budget.

Knowing the proclivity of some public officials to spend funds at their disposal arbitrarily without fiscal compliance, we call for prompt disciplinary measures over this to forestall unregulated expenditures.

2. Another issue that needs the attention of all the relevant anti-corruption agencies is the payment made to Dr. Shaibu Faisal through United Bank for Africa(UBA) account number 1001324745 of the sum of Twelve million seven hundred and twenty-eight thousand and thirty three kobo (N12,728,033) between the 24^th and 25^th of January 2017 being payment for 28 days, accommodation and movement of his family from the United States of America to Nigeria, this was never included in the budget so how and where were funds sourced to pay him. But we are much aware that Dr. Shaibu Faisal was resident in Maiduguri, Borno state at the time of his appointment. From our findings this payment had never accrued to any of his predecessors, so why him and where were the funds sourced from? This anomaly needs to be thoroughly investigated with appropriate measures taken and funds recovered where necessary.
3. In furtherance of our desire to bring to book all those mentioned in the aforementioned anomalies, we call on the anti-graft agencies to invite the following staff of the agency which we believe by their actions or inactions lead to these infractions being commited. They are:
4. M.Z. Mahmud
5. Emmanuel Oduh
6. Yibis Ritgak Gotan
7. Abubakar Muhammed
8. Head of Procurement- Mr Okoromadu
9. Ahmed Adamu
10. Soji
11. Head of store
12. Director finance and accounts- Mr. Stephen Yusuf
13. Head of Audit- Ada Egahi
14. Deputy Director HR- Mr Idris Bello

According to the group, many of the aforementioned officers have been deployed elsewhere, but at the period of these occurrences they were much around.

The group, in its prayers, called for an immediate investigation over the allegations and wants the following officers suspended:

1. Faisal Shaibu
2. Idris Bello
3. Egahi Ada
4. Emmanuel Oduh
5. Okoromadu
6. Stephen Yusuf