Christopher Oji
The Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission(EFCC) Brahim Magu, has warned fraudsters especially those who have been dropping his name and that of the officers and men of the Commission to fraudulently obtain money from unsuspecting members of the public to be prepared to face the heat from the Commission.
Magu gave this warning yesterday during a meeting with Officers and men of the Commission at the EFCC Corporate headquarters, Abuja.
Magu also urged the general public to be wary of influence peddlers as he said that the Commission under his watch would continue to do the right thing for a better tomorrow.
He said: “There are people who have been going about, telling people that they are my friends and officials of the Commission, they go about collecting money from suspects, with a promise to influence their cases here, let me make this very clear, I am nobody’s friend.
“When it comes to the job, which is the fight against corruption, I am no one’s friend. We are working hard to make sure such people are arrested, properly prosecuted and punished accordingly”, he said.
This is coming on the heels of the arrest of three suspects for dropping the name of the acting chairman and some senior officers of the Commission as well as impersonation of operatives of the EFCC, which Magu noted has been on the rise in recent times.
Three persons who are currently in the net of the EFCC, for falsely parading themselves as staff of the Commission and dropping staff names for illicit material gains from unsuspecting members of the public are Sani, Ike ,and Osita.
Sani, 38, a member of Charted Institute of Forensic and Professionals of Nigeria, CIFIPN, paraded himself as a Course 8 staff of the EFCC and as well as the Head of Forensic Unit of the Commission, a pretence he used to approach members of the public who have issues in the Commission with promise of assisting them get out of trouble and obtain money from them in the process.
Luck ran out on Sani when sometime in 2019, he collected N5, 000, 000 from Henry Agbo with a promise to influence the outcome of a criminal matter that concerned him in the Commission and to secure the release of a suspect of interest to him in the custody of the Lagos Office of the EFCC.
In his petition, Agbo said Sani introduced himself as a staff of the EFCC, in the Forensic Directorate and following their discussion, demanded N20, 000, 000 from him to kill a matter that concerned him in the EFCC as well as secure the release of a suspect who was of interest to him from the custody of the Lagos Office of the Commission.
The Acting Head and Public Relations and Media, Tony Orilade said: “The complainant revealed that he negotiated Sani’s price down to N10, 000, 000; and made advance payment of N5, 000, 000 cash to him.
“According to the complainant, Sani collected the money and neither delivered on his promise nor refunded the money he paid him, prompting him to report the matter to the EFCC, after a long and fruitless wait.
