The Federal Government has suspended three permanent secretaries and ordered the arrest of a man linked to the discovery of another alleged fake government agency operating within the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (OSGF).
The affected permanent secretaries are M.S. Danjuma, Nadungu Gagare and Richard P. Pheelangwah.
President Bola Tinubu also directed the immediate arrest of George Buchi Nwabueze, who the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) identified as the promoter of the alleged fake agency.
ICPC Chairman Dr Musa Aliyu, SAN, disclosed the development on Friday after briefing President Tinubu for the second time in two days.
According to Aliyu, the organisation, known as the National Brands Development and Made-in-Nigeria Special Project Office, had been operating from office space within the OSGF without presidential approval.
The ICPC chairman said the office was illegally allocated space within the government premises and was operating contrary to existing laws.
He identified Nwabueze as the promoter of the organisation and said investigations had uncovered several variations of his name.
The ICPC also suspects that some individuals within the OSGF actively collaborated with the alleged fake agency.
Aliyu said the commission had been working with officials of the OSGF to obtain relevant information about the organisation and establish how it was able to operate within the government complex.
After receiving the latest briefing, President Tinubu ordered Nwabueze’s arrest and directed the immediate suspension of the three permanent secretaries.
The ICPC said its investigation into the matter would continue.
The latest discovery is part of a wider investigation into alleged fictitious government agencies that began after the exposure of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIFC).
The alleged head of that organisation, Adeniyi Adeyemi, is currently facing prosecution over allegations including forgery and impersonation.
An interim ICPC report submitted to President Tinubu on August 6 had also identified two other allegedly fictitious organisations: the FCT Investment Promotion Agency and the Foreign Investment Promotion Agency and Public-Private Partnership.
The National Brands Development and Made-in-Nigeria Special Project Office is therefore the fourth alleged fake agency uncovered by the ICPC since the investigation into the PFIFC scandal began.
The ongoing investigation is expected to determine how the organisations were created, how they gained access to government facilities and whether government officials were involved in facilitating their operations.
