N256m fraud uncovered in Amnesty Office

The Presidential Amnesty Office of the Niger Delta is enmeshed in N255.9m (two hundred and fifty five million, nine hundred thousand) Naira allegations of fraud perpetrated using a fraudulent court process.

The Amnesty Office created by the Yaradua government to take care of ex-agitators who surrendered their arms to embrace the Federal Government’s amnesty program has been fraught with one form of fraud or the other since inception. 

In a space of four years of President Buhari’s administration, he has had to change the coordinator of that program on grounds of monumental fraud and yet the monster of corruption in the office is not abating. 

There seems to be a new method to legitimise fraud in Amnesty Office through the court processes. The new style is to get some claimants to file court papers purportedly suing the coordinator of the Amnesty Office, then turn around to reach an out of court settlement, enter into Terms of Settlement and get the Amnesty Office to agree to pay half of whatever monies being claimed.

For instance, on June 10, 2019, Clinton Orupade and Ramsey Nuware who claimed to be leaders of Benuwolo Camp of Amnesty phase 2 filed a suit at a federal high court in Yenagoa against the coordinator of Amnesty Office, Prof Charles Dokubo, claiming the sum of N492.37m as unpaid arrears from 2011 till date.  

Then in October 2019, they reached a biding Terms of Settlement with the Amnesty Office to pay half of the money immediately, “and this shall be entered as the final judgement of the court.”

However, Comrade Stephen Ebisintei, one of the leaders of Amnesty Phase 2, has disputed the claims alleging that “it’s nothing but fraud”. 

In a motion on notice filed by Aso Tambo, national chairman of Amnesty phase 2 and Ebisintei seeking to be joined in the terms of settlement, they claim that both Orupade and Nuware who are claimants to the monies are unknown to the Amnesty phase 2 and “are just fronts used  to siphon public money.”

Aso Tambo and Ebisintei are alleging that paying the monies encapsulated in the terms of settlement would amount to defrauding the federal government. “The execution of the Terms of Settlement agreed by parties in the substantive suit will work injustice against the finances of the federal government of Nigeria and defraud the federal government of  Nigeria as it will be made to pay monies not being owed to the plaintiff on record,” they said. 

“Why is the Coordinator allowing lawyers in the legal department mislead him into paying amnesty monies to wrong people? We need him to take charge and not disappoint President Buhari who has so much trust in him,” they said. 

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