PFIPC scandal: How Accountant-General exposed Adeniyi Adeyemi’s fake presidential agency

Prince Adeniyi Mathew Adeyemi

PFIPC scandal: How Accountant-General exposed Adeniyi Adeyemi’s fake presidential agency

The Accountant-General of the Federation, Shamseldeen Ogunjimi, has told a House of Representatives committee that a forged State House letter was used to secure official recognition for the controversial Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), with the document allegedly intercepted by the agency’s director-general, Adeniyi Adeyemi Matthew, to prevent early detection of the fraud.

Testifying before the House Ad Hoc Committee investigating the PFIPC controversy and the ₦1.3 billion allocated to the council in the 2026 Appropriation Act, Ogunjimi revealed that his office processed what appeared to be a legitimate State House correspondence in November 2024, only for investigations to later confirm the letter never originated from the Presidency.

The Accountant-General explained that his office received a letter dated November 7, 2024, bearing a State House reference number and requesting the creation of an administrative code for the Presidential Economic Advisory Council to enable budgeting, accounting, and financial reporting. Believing the request to be genuine because it appeared on official State House letterhead, the Treasury processed the application and sent its response to the State House on November 29, 2024, while copying the Budget Office of the Federation. However, Ogunjimi told lawmakers that the response never reached its intended destination because it was allegedly intercepted by Adeniyi Adeyemi. He was quoted as saying, “The letter that was written to the treasury for us to give an administrative code was responded to. Unfortunately, as events unfolded, it was discovered that that letter did not get to the State House. It was hijacked, precisely by the same man who claimed to be the director-general.” According to Ogunjimi, if the State House had received the response, officials would have immediately noticed that the original request for the administrative code was never issued by the Presidency, exposing the forgery much earlier.

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In a startling disclosure, the Accountant-General told the committee that every document submitted by the council’s promoters was fabricated, including a purported Act of the National Assembly creating the council and a fake letter of appointment allegedly signed by the Chief of Staff to the President. He declared that everything presented to the Treasury leadership was fake. Investigators have since confirmed that the appointment letter claiming President Bola Tinubu had appointed Adeyemi as Director-General carried the forged signature of Femi Gbajabiamila, the President’s Chief of Staff.

Ogunjimi also clarified how government staff became attached to the fake agency, revealing that two officers from the Office of the Accountant-General had originally been deployed to the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser to the President in 2010 and 2013. He stated, “We never knew. We believed, based on the records available to the Treasury, that those officers were still with the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser to the President. It was when all this matter came to light that we got to know that two of our staff were actually working or had been absorbed by the fake agency.” The Treasury was never formally informed that the officers had been attached to another entity. According to Ogunjimi, as far as he was concerned, they were dealing with a new agency, not the Office of the Chief Economic Adviser. When the council later requested the deployment of five additional personnel, only three were approved because officials considered the organisation too small for the number requested.

Despite processing some administrative requests, Ogunjimi stressed that no government funds were ever released to the PFIPC. The council had requested an establishment grant of ₦27.4 billion, but this was rejected because there was no budgetary provision. He added that while two domiciliary accounts in US dollars and British pounds were opened by the Central Bank of Nigeria for inflow purposes, they never became operational because the council failed to meet regulatory conditions.

Adeyemi was arrested by operatives of the Police Intelligence Response Team in Osun State on July 14 and is currently being held at the Nigeria Police Force National Cybercrime Centre in Abuja. He faces charges including forgery, impersonation, and related offences, with a maximum prison sentence of 21 years without the option of a fine on each charge. The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission has also interrogated him while in detention. Meanwhile, the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, voluntarily appeared before investigators on July 20, 2026, to provide a statement.

President Bola Tinubu has directed the ICPC to conduct a thorough investigation and submit a comprehensive report within 30 days. The investigation will examine forged appointment letters and official government documents, the opening of multiple bank accounts using forged documents, the role of any public officer who may have facilitated the scheme, and the institutional weaknesses that were exploited.