The Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has stumbled again on another arms deal scam worth $200m involving a Nigerian businessman and the government of Ukraine. The Punch reports that investigations revealed that Nigeria paid about $200m to the Ukrainian authorities for the airlifting of arms. The certain businessman was the one that spearheaded the deal on behalf of the federal government few years ago.
The payment for the arms deal was done through him to Ukraine because the said businessman had a memorandum of understanding with the Ukrainian authorities. He however decided to put the deal on hold because a previous administration in Nigeria was owing him. The said businessman has however been arrested by operatives of the commission last week and has since been kept in custody. He was among the 22 high profile personalities being interrogated by a 27-man Task Force set up by the Chairman of the EFCC, Mr. Ibrahim Magus, to look into the $2.1 billion arms procurement under President Goodluck Jonathan.
During interrogation, the suspect admitted before the EFCC operatives that the arms had not been brought into the country from the eastern European country. He further said that the arms transaction got stalled when a top military figure (now retired) came into the scene. He also mentioned the name of a service chief and a lady secretary in relation with the deal during the interrogation. It was however not stated whether those mentioned in relation to the $200m Ukrainian Arms deal would be interrogated or not.
An EFCC source hinted The Punch: “A lot of things are happening here. The task force is detaining a businessman who was involved in an arms deal involving $200m million. The man had a Memorandum of Understanding with the Ukrainian authorities to supply arms and ammunition of that amount to the federal government. ”The man told our operatives that even though the full money has been paid, the arms are still left in Ukraine.
He is a civilian, a businessman involved in the deal; he is insisting that Nigeria must pay him a particular amount of money before he would give Ukraine the directive to release the arms. He actually facilitated the deal. “Upon interrogation, he mentioned a top military officer and his secretary in relation to the deal. I cannot tell you whether the commission will invite them or when they would be invited; it is likely that they might be invited since their names have come up during the interrogation of the principal suspect.”
Investigation further revealed that there is a strong likelihood that the EFCC might invite two former service chiefs to face the Arms probe task force. It was learnt that the names of the two service chiefs have been thrown up repeatedly during the various sessions of interrogation by the Task Force. “The people being interrogated have been mentioning two service chiefs. We don’t take that as an indictment, we don’t jump to conclusions.
There is that likelihood that they might be summoned to say what they know about the $2.1bn arms deal,” the source said. Recall that media mogul, Raymond Dokpesi was arrested by the anti-graft commission for being a party of the arms purchase scandal involving the office of the former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, and the theft of N2.1 billion from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
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