In the controversial reinstatement of the fugitive that mismanaged pension administration fund the Senate is probing, AGF Abubakar Malami seems to have spearheaded the process.
The minister has admitted to a number of things—that he wrote all the letters to the Federal Civil Service Commission about Abdulrasheed Maina’s reinstatement, and that he met him in Dubai once, last year.
Maina took off in 2015, and was declared wanted after he allegedly mismanaged over N2 billion pension fraud and declared wanted by the EFCC.
Last month, the run-away civil servant returned, and was reinstated in the interior ministry form where firmer Presdient Goodluck Jonathan drafted him to head the Presidential Task Force on Pension reform in 2012.
Following President Muhammadu Buhari order to sack Maina, and probe his comeback, the Interior Minister Abdulrahaman Dambazzau and Malami were reported to have masterminded Maina’s return, according the report by the HCSC.
The Senate panel is conducting its own probe behind closed doors.
But according to The Nation quoting sources in the first meeting between the Senate panel and the two, and the ministry’s permanent secretary, no one is yet taking responsibility.
Dambazzau and the permanent secretary insisted that they played no role in Maina’s recall that the attorney general admitted writing three letters to the Federal Civil Service Commission (FCSC) on Maina. But he said he did not bring him back.
Another source close to the committee told the newspaper that Malami agreed before the parliamentary panel that he held a meeting with Maina in Dubai. “Although he insisted that he was not responsible for his dramatic return to the service,” the source said.
“The committee discovered that three letters were written by the Justice Minister asking questions from the FCSC on Maina. There is no record that the questions were answered by the FCSC in any correspondence.
“The fourth letter was written by the Attorney-general in January as a directive to the Civil Service Commission to reinstate Maina. In the letter, the AG asked for Maina’s status, his position, rank and next rank.
“There was another letter in February where the AG directed the Civil Service Commission to reinstate Maina. The committee frowned at this because, under the constitution, they felt the AG cannot issue that kind of directive.”
Malami was said to have written another letter in April asking whether the reinstatement had been effected. In that letter, he directed the FCSC to promote Maina to Director.
“When committee members asked the AG to react to the allegations that he wrote the letters, the AG agreed that he wrote them, but said he could not remember all that he wrote,” the source added.
He then pleaded with the committee to allow him contact his files to ascertain the content. He promised to return Thursday.
“The committee was satisfied that the Head of Service (HoS) of the Federation documented everything.
The committee will be ascertaining where the Ministry of Interior got the letter it relied upon to reinstate Maina.
Malami is one of the members of the Aso Rock cabal that many believe has been working at cross-purposes to the administration of Buhari whose core mission is to rid Nigeria of corruption.
The AGF has been involved in a string of corruption cases he has been swinging in his own interest.