Soni Daniel, Northern Region Editor
News of the arrest and handing over of Abdurasheed Maina, Chairman of the controversial Pension Reform Task Team, PRTT, by the Department of State Services must have been received with both glee and gloom nationwide, for obvious reasons. The man, Maina, a Borno State mandarin, is seen both as a saint and a villain depending on which side of the divide the viewer belongs.
But for many top-ranking and middle-cadre public servants who worked directly or vicariously with him at PRTT under the Jonathan Presidency, Maina is nothing but a generous benefactor who should be cheered while retired Nigerian workers, whose fate remains dimmed after many years of service to the country without their pensions, the man and his activities under the PPRTT should be subjected to serious scrutiny and sanctions applied for causing them untold hardship and pains.
Given the many stories of how Maina ran the PRTT, many Nigerians now see him more of avoidable pain unconsciously thrust on the neck of innocent Nigerian pensioners and their families by a system that fell for his promise of reforming the pension system in Nigeria and plucking the loopholes that had inflicted heavy losses on retirees’ welfare resources and left pensioners sleeping endlessly in government offices and public places waiting for their stipends. In some cases, many of the pensioners died in penury and shame while still waiting for their elusive retirement benefits.
It was in a bid to address these fissures and breathe fresh air into the pension administration system that the President Goodluck Jonathan-led administration happily brought Maina to bring his magic wand to bear on the reformation of the process. Before then, Maina had worked quietly at the Customs, Immigration and Prison Pensions Office, CIPPO, as a deputy director from 2008.
In fact, to demonstrate the seriousness with which the Presidency gave to the Maina team, the task force was not only elevated to a Presidential blessing, it was also provided with more than enough goodwill, men and materials to accomplish its set goal, which was primarily to capture all Nigerian workers across the world, establish their pension data and pay them as and when due.
While Maina took up the job in 2008, allegations of wrongdoing against him had already overwhelmed the Presidency and the National Assembly in 2010. By 2013 the whole country had been awash with stories of pension fraud and the need to flush Maina from the post.
The major accusation against Maina by the Senate, led by Senator Alloysious Etok, was that rather than reform the pension system by removing ghost pensioners, he had actually expanded the base with ghost pensioners and used them to commit pension fraud to the tune of N195 billion, something that Maina vehemently denied and in turn accused the lawmakers of demanding N3 billion bribe from him. He said it was because he refused to pay the bribe that the Senators moved against him and he successfully got an order from the court to stop the police from arresting him.
Like a good actor who understands when best to mount the stage to deliver his performance and quit while the ovation is loudest, Maina, understood the Nigerian system very well and knew what to do, when, how and who to deal with in order to get the best result.
He also knew those to avoid in the course of his work. For this reason, he surrounded himself with the top echelon of the security agencies-police, DSS, EFCC, ICPC- and took care of their relationship, while he routinely funded top public officers in the three tiers of the government- Presidency, legislature and the judiciary- the outcome of which made it impossible for the security agencies to move against him despite the barrage of alleged financial wrongdoings against him.
As at the time Maina was made chairman of PRTT, the sum of N24 billion had already been set aside by the federal government in various banks to use and pay the retirees, most of whom had suffered and died in the process of getting their pensions and gratuities without success. But after getting into the office and seeing the huge sums of money at his disposal, Maina, working in league with senior officials of government, appeared to have had a change of mind: It was that change of objective that led to the alleged mismanagement of pension fund under him.
In a damning report prepared by the EFCC marked CR: 3000/EFCC/ABJ/FAFI/VOL.1/238 and dated August 1, 2016, the commission chronicled how top government officials fell over one another to benefit from fraudulent baits allegedly offered them by Maina under the guise of travelling abroad to conduct biometric verification of Nigerian pensioners.
In one of the cases, Maina approved the sum of N36 million for the purpose of the PRTT to travel to New York for the purpose of carrying out biometric verification of pensioners in the United States. But curiously, some top government officials received N3, 286,000 each for the trip, which was never undertaken.
Similarly, on the same list were the names of a Director, who got N2, 838,000 for the phantom trip, another Director General, who was paid N4,854,000, followed by a Director and Assistant Director under him, who also got N2,895,000 and N2,045,000 respectively for the fake trip.
Shortly after that, the same PRTT approved the sharing of another sum of N23 million this time to top government officials for the purpose of travelling to the United Kingdom for the purpose of undertaking biometric verification of pensioners.
Following on the heels of that, Maina also approved the sharing of another sum of N40.6 million to ‘lucky’ top officials to ‘travel to Atlanta in the United States to conduct their own phase of verification of Nigerian pensioners.
For that purpose, a former HoS got N4,854,000, a former top official of the EFCC got N4,854,000, a former Permanent Secretary, State House received N4,086,000, another N2,738,000 was paid to another top official of the EFCC, while three operatives of the commission got N1,482,960 and N2,638,000 respectively.
A staff of the NIA received N 2,638,000 for the trip. The same tactic was used by Maina and his cronies to send teams to ‘South Africa, ‘Ghana’, ‘36 states’ of the federation, ‘zonal levels’ and others to siphon different sums of public funds into their banks accounts in the name of biometric verification.
On the purported trip for verification of pensioners in South Africa, the sum of N18.4million was released by Maina and paid to top government officials, among whom was the Director General of budget, who got N3, 056,000. The sum of N9.1 million was expended as estacode for those who ‘went for verification in Ghana’ out of which a Director of Intelligence was paid the sum of N1,388,000 through his First Bank account while two female staff of EFCC got N1,275,000 each as part of the national cake.
And to capture police pensioners across the states, the sum of N160,471,200 was released and shared to the lucky beneficiaries by Maina. Similarly, for the capturing of biometric data of retirees, Maina shared the sum of N15,477,900 to those who were lucky enough to be selected to go round the six geo-political zones of the country after such data had been captured on state by state basis.
He was also accused in a report by the EFCC to the Attorney General of the Federation, of using fake contract to divert the sum of N2.7 billion, a development that prompted the anti-graft agency to charge some of the contractors and top government officials to court.
The report said in part:”Investigation revealed that Mr. Maina fictitiously owned and operated the following accounts with a bank : Cluster Logistics, Drew Investment & Construction Ltd, Kongolo Dynamics Cleaning Ltd, “Dr” AbduUahi A. Faizal, Nafisatu Aliyu Yeldu and Abdulrasheed Abdullahi Maina.
“That Analysis of the above listed accounts revealed a total turnover of more than N2.7 billion. It is important to note that 95% of deposits into the fraudulent accounts were cash deposits made by bankers in their own names and other fictitious names.
Beyond the generous ‘sharing’ of pension funds to top government functionaries to curry their favour, Maina was also accused by the anti-graft agency of engaging in contract fraud and diversion of funds through proxies and associates via banks and bureau de change.
The report accused Maina of laundering the sum of N14, 374,236,846.09 between 2008 and 2013 using the following methods, but Maina denied all of them:
*Award of fictitious contracts to cronies – N5, 761,150,608.44
*Payment to ghost pensioners – N829, 902,260.40
*Allowances for non-existing trips – N1, 365,821,942.91
*Purported payment to state pensions boards – N4, 192,825,310.99
*Purported payment to NUP – N2, 290,593,322.35
* Association Of Federal Public Service Retirees (AFPSR) – N253,390,300
Many Nigerians became his beneficiaries while the pensioners got little or nothing. Maina played smart. He used government funds to share to top government officials to curry their favour and they stood up to defend him when he was recommended for sack by the Senate.
It was clear at the time that even the Presidency was handicapped because President Goodluck Jonathan could neither sack nor reprimand the powerful Maina apparently due to conflicting reports from those who praised him for his ‘good deeds and generosity and those who presented him as a ‘villain’ to the Presidency.
At a point in February 2013, the Senate threatened to move against Jonathan for ignoring their resolutions to sack Maina over alleged mismanagement of pension fund. The Inspector General of Police, the DG DSS, the DG NIA, ICPC, EFCC and many other top government officials were confused on how to deal with Maina, having been regular beneficiaries of his ‘inexplicable magnanimity and philanthropy’.
It was at that point that the Senators led by its President, David Mark, asked Jonathan to either stick with Maina and lose their support or sack Maina and earn their support.
Mark said: “If President Jonathan, who, like past presidents, has flouted past resolutions of the Senate without consequences, ignores this one, the senate will “bite”. Mark was clear in his warning, appearing livid during an unusually stormy session.
“The president has a choice between Mr. Maina, accused of unimaginable fraud, and the Senate.
“The executive now has to choose between Maina and the Senate, that is the bottom line. If they choose to go along with Maina, fine, we will react accordingly. And to extend the hand of friendship is the correct thing to do because we must work together. There is no running away from that one. It is a test case. If Maina remains, then the Senate will react appropriately and I don’t think we are neither short of ideas nor are we short of what we want to do. We know the step to take.
“Let me assure you that the Senate has the teeth to bite and it will bite when it is time to bite. Nobody can stop it,” Mark threatened.
The Senate also lashed out at the then Inspector General of Police for claiming that his men could not locate and arrest Maina despite several orders and resolutions from the NASS against the man.
As the Buhari administration dawned, it was expected that the powers of Maina would be curtailed or at least, he would be arrested, tried and demystified but that did not happen apparently because his beneficiaries were still very large and active in the public domain-security agencies, legislature, judiciary inclusive. In fact, it is being speculated that Maina had been enjoying exclusive protection by a top DSS official, who also provided him with a ‘Safe House’ meant for top diplomats and government functionaries.
And when the DSS top brass was asked why his men were protecting Maina from prosecution, he angrily but boastfully replied that he had no knowledge that Maina was wanted by any agency in the country.
Even while they belatedly declared him wanted after failing severally to honour many invitations to clear himself of graft charges, Maina boldly approached a Federal High Court in Abuja and got an order stopping the EFCC from declaring him wanted.
As at the time of his arrest early this week, the only basis of holding out hope is that perhaps powerful government agencies and individuals who were behind him, would see reasons to cooperate with EFCC to charge him to court for him to go there and prove his innocence or otherwise.
But doing so would likely be tough and dangerous for both parties: If Maina opens up on what transpired at the PRTT, many top government officials, who benefitted generously from the largesse, may be swept under and their sources of income torpedoed.
On the other hand, Maina may continue to remain silent and opt for full trial in court, basking in the hope his ‘friends’ would not abandon him at his most crucial moment of need.
There is hope the court may exploit any loophole by EFCC and quash all the charges prepared by the anti-graft against him, just to set Maina free.
Even in the EFCC custody, Maina still remains very powerful and fearsome and indeed a dangerous personality to toy with by an ordinary Nigerian.
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