The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has debunked the report that its chairman Abdulrasheed Bawa and Tunde Ayeni both embarked on a clandestine journey to Dubai.
The agency was reacting to an allegation by an online newspaper the duo allegedly met at a location in Abuja on Wednesday night where the decision to proceed to Dubai was reached.
The newspaper in a report titled “EXCLUSIVE: CONTROVERSIAL BUSINESSMAN TUNDE AYENI, EFCC BOSS HEAD FOR DUBAI FOR UNDISCLOSED MISSION.” gave account of the supposed meeting.
The newspaper wrote: “In what could best be described as a renewed dalliance, the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa, and the defunct Skye Bank Chairman, John Olatunde Ayeni, are heading for Dubai in the United Arabs Emirate any moment from now.
“An impeccable source told this newspaper that while Ayeni and Bawa’s mission in Dubai is not immediately clear, it might not be unconnected with how the anti-graft agency could become handy in the promotion of Ayeni’s 2023 political interests.
“There has been increasing dalliance in recent times between Ayeni who superintended over the collapse of Skye Bank and the EFCC chairman.
“Another close confidant of Ayeni, namely Bashiru Hadeja, was also said to be in the know of the meeting and travel plans to the UAE.
“The former Skye Bank chairman has been left off the hook as EFCC seemed to have abandoned the case of how he allegedly turned the defunct bank’s deposit into slush fund for PDP in the 2015 election.
“Perhaps goaded by Ayeni, the EFCC chairman has been pursuing cases involving more of All Progressives Congress states and chieftains than PDP.”
However, reacting to the publication on Friday, the EFCC noted that the story is entirely false.
The statement issued by Wilson Uwujaren, EFCC’s Head, Media and Publicity reads;
“The attention of the Commission has been drawn to a so-called “exclusive’’ news report making the rounds on social media to the effect that the EFCC Chairman, Abdulrasheed Bawa, and former Chairman of the defunct Skye Bank, Mr. Tunde Ayeni, are travelling together, abroad, on a clandestine, self-serving mission.
“The story, which vainly tries to push a certain malodorous agenda, is absolutely FALSE.
“If it were not for its potential to confound and confuse the unwary, the Commission would have ignored the story.
“However, there is every need to set the facts straight.
“To start with, there was never a meeting and certainly no “plan” between the EFCC Chair and Mr. Ayeni to go anywhere together.
“Furthermore, while the EFCC Chairman is at this time on an approved mission abroad, Ayeni, whom the fiction-turned-news story says is on a clandestine trip with Mr. Bawa, is, from checks, right here in Nigeria. A cursory check would have confirmed that.
“If the design is to get the Commission to compromise its mandate to investigate and prosecute all cases of economic and financial crimes, then the purveyors of the tendentious story have failed. Woefully.
“No matter what, the Commission will be guided only by that mandate and its very clear Standard Operating Procedure and WILL NOT be blackmailed or act in any way predetermined or teleguided by private interests.
“The EFCC WILL ONLY pursue the public interest as defined by the law establishing the Commission.”
