• Cartel, NIPOST workers embezzle stamp duty funds – Garba Shehu

Pro-democracy campaigner and presidential candidate of the African Action Alliance, Omoyele Sowore, has accused Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, and the Central Bank Governor, Godwin Emefiele, of colluding to cover up N89.09tn stamp duty alleged scam.

Sowore, who spoke on Tuesday described the stamp duty issue as “monumental corruption” and Nigeria’s biggest financial scam.

A member of the House of Representatives from Jigawa, Gudaji Kazaure, had in a video that had gone viral, accused Emefiele of attempts to cover up facts surrounding the collection of the controversial N89.09 trillion Stamp Duty funds.

The lawmaker further alleged that he was deliberately being denied access to present a preliminary report of a committee set up by President Muhammadu Buhari to look into the alleged stamp duty funds being withheld by the CBN led by Emefiele.

Kazaure also appealed to President Buhari to either allow him to present his report to him or immediately order a thorough investigation of the alleged stamp duty funds fraud.

However, the presidency through the Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity to President Buhari, Malam Garba Shehu, described Kazaure’s committee as illegal which was dissolved on the directive of Mr President.

Shehu said, “he entire net worth of the nation’s financial sector, the assets of the banking sector put together are not worth N50 trillion, not to talk of the kind of money he is talking about.”

In his reaction, Sowore listed five national focal financial problems the alleged diverted N89.09tn Stamp Duty funds could solve, adding that it was unfortunate that many Nigerian media and most Nigerians kept mute over the matter.

This was despite Kazaure’s revelation that the Department of State Services arrested the CBN governor but granted him bail after claiming he had heart issues.

“The Stamp Duty Scam is likely Nigeria’s biggest financial scam in recent times. It was perpetrated by the Central Bank Governor, Godwin Emefiele ,and President Muhammadu Buhari and his cronies,” said Sowore.

Cartel, NIPOST workers embezzle stamp duty funds – Garba Shehu

Meanwhile, the Presidency has alleged that a cartel colluded with some staff of the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST), to embezzle money realised from Stamp Duty.

Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, made the allegation on Tuesday, in a response to the challenge thrown at him by a member of the House of Representatives, Muhammadu Gudaji Kazaure.

Kazaure alleged that N89 trillion collected as Stamp Duty had gone missing.

The lawmaker also claimed that President Muhammadu Buhari constituted a committee, with him as secretary, to recover the missing fund.

But Shehu, in a statement issued Tuesday, noted that President Buhari disbanded the committee because of lack of progress in its assignment.

He said on assumption of office in 2015, the President had noticed an anomaly in the law which mandates the collection of a token on banking transactions and attempted to rectify it.

Shehu said the cartel that had been prevented from stealing the collection, came back in the form of consultants to recover the Stamp Duty.

The statement read, “President Muhammadu Buhari came into office in 2015 to find that a law, which stipulated for the collection of a token on banking transactions existed but was not being correctly implemented

“This anomaly arose because certain characters apparently formed a cartel with collaborators in the Nigerian Postal Service, NIPOST and were allegedly collecting and pocketing this money.

“Soon after, a non-government organisation posited to the administration that the Nigerian government had lost the sum of over N20 trillion to the Nigerian Inter-bank Settlement System (NIBSS) between 2013-2016 in this regard, claiming that the said sum could be recovered and paid back into the government coffers.

“The consultants asked to be paid a professional fee of 7.5 percent and were placed under the supervision of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF.

“Following the lack of progress in the promised recovery, the late Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari, wrote on March 8, 2018, to the SGF conveying a presidential directive that following the lack of progress and several expressed concerns received, the activities of the consultants be discontinued.

“In the aftermath of this dismissal, the consultants sued the government.

“A court of competent jurisdiction subsequently ruled in favour of the government.

“Arising from the outcome of the litigation and the well known controversy on the legally responsible agent for collecting this levy, the administration went to the National Assembly and caused an amendment to the law and removed NIPOST from the duty of its collection.

“Having lost a potentially “lucrative” line of “business”, the sacked characters returned to the drawing board to formulate one form of trick or another to intimidate the government, but the vigilant teams of the administration kept them at bay.

“Lately, they returned to the government through Hon. Muhammadu Gudaji Kazaure with a plan to track the so-called lost stamp duties with the erstwhile consultant as chairman and Hon. Gudaji as secretary.

“When it emerged that the petitioner and lead consultant of the committee the President had dissolved via the late Abba Kyari’s letter of March 28 had masqueraded himself and re-emerged as the chairman of the new recovery committee championed by the Hon. Gudaji, the President rescinded the approval he gave and asked that it be stopped from operating under the seal of his office.

“In addition to this committee being chaired by a petitioner, there were also other concerns relating to natural justice and fair hearing in having the Chief Justice of the Federation as a committee member and a serving member of the House of Representatives as Secretary, which are not in line with Section 5(1),(a)&(b) of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).

“Once the President rescinded his approval to constitute this Committee, lost all legitimacy.

“Arguments have in recent days been flying left and right over the rightfulness of a committee being dissolved.

“People are entitled to hold opinions. But these opinions do not change the fact that under our constitution, the power of the president to appoint and remove persons or groups is duly entrenched and unless such powers are shared with the Parliament, the President can hire and fire literally at will, and in line with the law.

“To go back to the main issue though, it is now evident that the consultants and petitioners’ claims of a missing N89 trillion from stamp duty appears false and a figment of their malicious imaginations.

“The same set of consultants claimed in 2016 there was N20 trillion to be collected. It was found to be false. The entire banking sector deposit is not even up to half of N89 trillion.

“Indeed, if the Federal Government can find N89 trillion, it can pay off all its debt, both foreign and local currency and all state government debts and still have over N10 trillion left.

“So, the claim by these so-called consultants and the disbanded committee is totally ridiculous and a complete mockery.

“Our good friend and a committed party member, Hon Gudaji, has tried to draw me into a public debate which I don’t consider a good idea.

“In a video clip in Hausa and a press release in English both by this good friend of the administration, Hon. Gudaji Kazaure invited me to answer questions, some of which are completely lacking in imagination.

“I would have ignored the allegations therein. Yet, a wise man once said that a lie can travel the world, while the truth is still wearing his shoes.

“It is on the basis of the above that I decided to put some things straight and respond directly to Hon. Kazaure’s questions posed to me.

“Specifically, I will respond to each of his questions as follows:

(A) The money with CBN I & E window Account stood at $171 billion dollars as at 2020 what is the source of that money?”

To my knowledge, the CBN-established Investors and Exporters (I&E) Window is a foreign exchange trading platform where banks and other authorized dealers can buy or sell foreign exchange. These trades are recorded by the CBN daily and reported as turnover or activity in the market.

Contrary to Hon. Kazaure’s assertion, the I&E window is NOT an “account” where foreign exchange is deposited. It is simply a platform for trading foreign exchange. As of April 2020, the total amount of foreign exchange traded (either bought or sold) in the window was about $171 billion. The size of this amount suggests that there is adequate liquidity or availability of foreign exchange and that anyone who wants to buy or sell would easily find a counterparty to trade with. The amount does not mean that we have $171 billion stacked away in some vault or saved in any account.

Note that both the CBN and authorised dealers are free to bring foreign exchange to the window, and in fact, the CBN is not the major seller of Foreign Exchange in that segment of the market.

(B) “The N23.4 trillion CBN gave as a loan to some banks, what is the source of that money?”

The CBN is best placed to respond to this question though I must say the assertion itself is both baseless and misleading. The total balance sheet of the CBN is not anywhere near N23 trillion. So how can it give such an amount in loans to any or some banks?

(C) The N13 trillion loan to the federal government from FMDQ, what is the source of that?”

According to the DMO, the total amount of Nigeria’s domestic debt as of September 2022 is N21.6 trillion. Is Hon. Kazaure suggesting that a small company in Lagos holds over 60 percent of Nigeria’s domestic debt? More also, of the N21.6 trillion domestic debt, only N4.5 trillion are in Treasury Bills? How then can a company in Lagos hold more treasury bills (N13 trillion) than the entire treasury bills issued by the Federal Government? For the avoidance of doubt, I also took time to reach out to the FMDQ ( Financial Markets Derivative Quotes) and understand from their audited financial statements that their holdings of FGN Treasury bills is just N7.99 billion as of December 2021.

(D) Finally, what is the total equity of CBN and its National budget?”

Anyone who understands this question should provide an answer. I can offer this information: on an annual basis and in line with the Fiscal Responsibility Act, the CBN transfers 80 percent of its operating surplus to the Federal Government as part of the budget revenues. In the last 6 years, this contribution has amounted to over N150 billion.

Let me inform you that Mr President has not completely ignored these matters. Indeed, a duly authorised committee under the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), is working to reconcile, recover and transfer all Stamp Duties into Stamp Duties Central Account.

The work is ongoing, it is not finished yet and the President will continue to show his keen interest in the matter of Stamp Duty collection.