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$ 1 Billion Pension Scam: ‘One Person Had over 555 accounts in 1 bank’ – Task Force

By on February 3, 2012

The Chairman of the Pension Reform Task Force, Abdulrasheed Maina has made startling new revelations concerning the rot and corruption in the pensions department within the Office of the Head of Service.

The Chairman met with the Acting Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Ekpo Nta and reported the task force’s findings.

Maina disclosed that over N 3.3 billion was being embezzled by corrupt pension officials monthly via a system of ghost pensioners programmed into a central database. Maina’s team explained how they used proprietary software to discover over 100,000 ghost pensioners.

An idle N 28 billion police pension fund was found dormant in one account and at the Police Pension Office, according to Maina, “the team also discovered some fraud that led to the reduction of their monthly delivery from the Budget Office from N1.5 billion, to N500 million.”

In what appears to be a competition of “how much can we steal”? Amongst the senior officials in charge of pensions, another individual linked to the corruption was found to have 555 accounts in 1 single bank. Maina believes is a collaboration to commit fraud between the banking officials and the pension officer.

His words: “A figure of 258,000 pensioners was submitted to the Budget Office by the ‘cartel’ in the Pension Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation for which N5 billion was usually released monthly.

“But out of the N5 billion, the task force discovered that the government only needed N1.7 billion out of N5billion to pay the 70,657 genuine pensioners.

“The government is only paying N1.7billion to pensioners instead of the hitherto N5billion. Obviously, those profiting from the scam were not happy. They have been issuing threats to members of my team.

“We discovered about 71,133 ghost pensioners within the system, for whom the “cartel” behind the fraud had been collecting government money for years.

“Also, about 44,320 retired persons were discovered never to have been paid their pension since 1968 and 1975. We have brought some of these pensioners on board and they now enjoy their pension.

“During the systems review, we uncovered 66 fake accounts. There was a situation where about 555 accounts belonging to one person were discovered in a particular bank.

“We felt this could not have been possible without connivance of the bank management. It is really unfortunate and sad.”

Maina attributed the success of the investigations to collaboration between various security agencies including EFCC, ICPC, Customs and Immigration.

Seeking closer ties with ICPC in order to prosecute those found culpable in the corruption, Maina stated, “If we can make these shocking discoveries in the Pension Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation alone, you can imagine the extent of fraud in all the 42 pension offices nationwide.”

5 Comments

  1. Anonymous

    February 3, 2012 at 10:42 am

    Nigerians please READ the NNPC Policy .

    And TELL me why the crop of thieves starting from the GROUP manging Directors
    are STILL in office .

    Madam MInister ,

    (1)please ASK yourself , Have these managers respected there VALUES .

    (2) With the fraud withing the NNPC and its agents, the
    managers,starting from GROUP Manging directors Have failed Wholefully ,
    defrauding the NATION and bastardising with huge abuse the oil sector which
    ought to keep every Nigerian happy.

    (3) No body is above the law , these guys have committed crimes, relocating
    them within NNPC is Nothing More like a MOCKERY to Nigerians .

    MADAM minister ITS A BIG SHAME .

    EFCC – SHAME TO YOU .

    NASS — SHAME YOU ARE ALL INVOLVED .

    PRESIDENT – NIGERIAN ARE DISAPPOINTED

    READ BELOW NNPC POLICY

    Established by the NNPC Act No. 33 of 1st April, 1977

    Mandate

    Management of All Government in the Nigerian oil Industry
    Cordinating the development of Nigerias first gas master plan (GMP)
    NEnsures efficient and effective operations in both downstream and upstream
    operations in the oil and gas sector
    Co-ordinates the activities of its subsidiaries for effective service
    delivery

  2. Anonymous

    February 3, 2012 at 12:33 pm

    Established by the NNPC Act No. 33 of 1st April, 1977

    Mandate Management of All Government in the Nigerian oil Industry
    Coordinating the development of Nigerias first gas master plan (GMP)
    Ensures efficient and effective operations in both downstream and upstream
    operations in the oil and gas sector
    Co-ordinates the activities of its subsidiaries for effective service
    delivery

     

    Nigerians Please READ the NNPC Policy above .

    And TELL me why the crops of thieves starting from the GROUP managing Directors

    are STILL in office.

    Madam Minister,

    (1) Please ASK yourself, Have these managers respected there VALUES?.

    (2) With the fraud within the NNPC and its agents, the

    managers, starting from GROUP Managing directors have failed Woefully,

    defrauding the NATION and bastardising the sector  with huge abuse in  the oil sector which

    ought to keep every Nigerian happy.

    (3) No body is above the law, these guys have committed crimes, relocating

    them within NNPC is Nothing More like a MOCKERY to Nigerians.

    MADAM Minister IT’S A BIG SHAME.

    EFCC – SHAME TO YOU.

    NASS — SHAME YOU ARE ALL INVOLVED.

    PRESIDENT – NIGERIAN ARE DISAPPOINTED

    READ BELOW NNPC POLICY

  3. Anonymous

    February 6, 2012 at 5:49 am

    Nigerians please READ the NNPC Policy.
     
    And TELL me why the crops of thieves starting from the GROUP managing Directors are STILL in office.
     
    Established by the NNPC Act No. 33 of 1st April, 1977
     
    Mandate
    Management of All Government in the Nigerian oil Industry
    Coordinating the development of Nigerians first gas master plan (GMP)
    Ensures efficient and effective operations in both downstream and upstream operations in the oil and gas sector
    Co-ordinates the activities of its subsidiaries for effective service delivery.
     
    Madam Minister,
     
    (1) Please ASK yourself, Have these managers respected there VALUES .
     
    (2) With the huge fraud within the NNPC and its agents, the managers, starting from GROUP Managing directors have failed Woefully, defrauding the NATION and bastardising with huge abuse the oil sector which ought to keep every Nigerian happy.
     
    (3) No body is above the law , these guys have committed crimes, relocating them within NNPC is Nothing More like a MOCKERY to Nigerians .
     
    MADAM Minister IT’S A BIG SHAME, you cannot take action on the thieves .
     
    EFCC – SHAME TO YOU.
     
    NASS — SHAME YOU ARE ALL INVOLVED.
     
    PRESIDENT – NIGERIAN ARE DISAPPOINTED
     
    READ BELOW NNPC POLICY
     

  4. Planbabe

    March 7, 2012 at 7:39 pm

    rubbish

  5. Planababe

    March 7, 2012 at 7:41 pm

    how can we have only 70,657 genuine pensioners with the population of Nigeria , from what i can see this news is not genuine, maina himself is a criminal. Nigeria no way forward.