EFCC keeps mum about Ganduje’s corruption allegation

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has refused to
comment on viral video clips which show Governor Abdullahi Ganduje
of Kano State allegedly receiving bribes in dollars from
contractors.

In the videos, which were first posted by an online news medium,
Daily Nigerian, Ganduje was seen receiving wads of dollar bills
said to be part-payment of $5m allegedly given to him as a kickback
from government contractor.

The Kano State House of Assembly had on Monday constituted a
seven-man ad hoc committee to investigate and unravel the
authenticity of the video.

In an earlier report also, Daily Nigerian had claimed that the
video had been authenticated by experts and that security agencies
had played the video for President Muhammadu Buhari to watch.

However, attempts to get the EFCC to speak on the matter since
Wednesday up till Friday have proved abortive.

When contacted on the telephone, the Spokesperson for the EFCC,
Mr. Wilson Uwujaren, said he would find out if the matter was under
investigation and respond appropriately.

“I will find out and get back to you,” he said.

However, subsequent calls put through to Uwujaren were not
answered while a text message sent to him was not replied to as of
press time on Friday.

Meanwhile, the Presidency on Friday said there was little or
nothing President Muhammadu Buhari could do about the viral
video.

The Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and
Publicity, Garba Shehu, said this in an interview with our
correspondent.

Our reporter had sought to know if the President was aware of
the video and if he would invite the governor to hear from him.

But Shehu said the governor was not accountable to the
President.

He noted that the Kano State House of Assembly, that is
constitutionally empowered to handle such cases, had already
started investigating the matter.

The presidential spokesman said, “We all know that the governor
is not accountable to the President. The House of Assembly is
empowered by law to handle the case and we are all aware that the
assembly has started investigating the matter.

“If we were in the military era, a military Head of State could
question a military governor on matters like this. But it is not
applicable in a democracy.

“The growing concern by some people has been that the
anti-corruption fight at the federal level is not getting to the
state and local government levels.

“But the President is helpless as far as the two other tiers of
government are concerned. The President can’t force the state and
local governments. He has no such powers under the
constitution.”

Meanwhile, the committee constituted by the state House of
Assembly to probe the authenticity of the video clip, has summoned
the Daily Nigerian Editor-in-Chief, Ja’afar Ja’afar, to appear
before it. The committee’s Secretary, Mujtafa Adamu Aminu, made the
disclosure during an interview with journalists in Kano on
Friday.

He said the committee had in a letter dated October 19, 2018,
requested the Daily Nigerian boss to appear before it on Thursday,
October 26, 2018 at the Assembly Complex.

According to him, the committee had already visited the state
Commissioner of Police, Mr. Rabi’u Yusuf, and the state Director of
the Department of State Services, with a view to soliciting their
support to provide security at the complex, venue of the
sitting.