Oyo uncovers N2.6 billion pension fraud

GBENRO ADESINA/IBADAN

Oyo State government in western Nigeria has uncovered a pension fraud running into N2.6 billion in its Local Government Service Pensions Board.

This was disclosed today by Chief Lasisi Ayankojo, chairman of the board and the Local Government Service Commission as contained in a statement signed by Dr. Festus Adedayo, the special Adviser to Governor Abiola Ajimobi.

According to Ayankojo, the interim investigative report of the commission into the account of the board between September 2010 and March, 2011, which unearthed the fraud, had indicted ten civil servants for being the architects of the scam.

Ayankojo said that eight of the alleged perpetrators of the fraud were at present being detained by the police while two of them had escaped.

He said that upon the receipt of the report of the committee, the board met Governor Abiola Ajimobi, who ordered that the board should get to the roots of the scam immediately.

Delving into the mode of the perpetration of the fraud, Ayankojo disclosed that the board discovered this fraud following complaints by local government workers and retired teacher who claimed that their pensions had not been paid to them by government.

He said that upon the receipt of the complaints, the board set up a committee to look into the details of the retirees’ grouses, stating that the committee, in the process of its work, found out that monies were indeed collected by civil servant intermediaries working in the commission and never remitted to the pensioners.

Revealing how these anomalies came into being, Ayankojo said that the total amount of the money involved in the scam was collected via issuance of cheques to the affected civil servants in their own personal names, rather than through e-payment into the accounts of pensioners, a situation he said made the fraud to sail through easily.

Giving a detailed account of how the suspects allegedly stole the state money earmarked for pensioners, Ayankojo said the then Executive Secretary and Director, Finance and Administration of the board, between September, 2010 and November 2010 withdrew by cash the sum of N680, 430,646.69 from the Local Government Staff Account meant for pensioners, while these same two individuals withdrew the sum of N1, 353,868,062.60 from the Teachers Account of the board.

The Chairman said that the two officers of the board had at present absconded and all efforts made by the police to apprehend them had failed.

Ayankojo also said that the two officers of the board, alongside seven other top civil servants of the board equally collected the sum of N173, 800,000 from the pensioners’ accounts between September 2010 and March 2011.

He alleged that another staff of the account department of the board, at various times within the period, personally withdrew N401 million of the board’s money earmarked for pensioners.

According to Ayankojo, while they were being interrogated by the police, the suspects claimed that they collected the cheques of the amount stolen from the Executive Secretary who is currently at large and after cashing the cheque, returned the money to the Secretary.

Ayankojo said that the state government had no option but to invite the police to get into the root of the matter so as to conform with the administration’s abidance with due process and accountability.

“We enjoin pensioners in the state to be patient with us. What we are doing now is to protect their interests. That is why we are telling the whole world what has happened that is causing delay in the payment of their pension money,” Ayankojo said.

Asked whether politicians of the immediate past government were the ultimate receivers of these allegedly stolen pensioners’ money, Ayankojo said he could not say with certainty since the matter is now being probed by the police.

Ayankojo explained that this alleged fraud had been responsible for the slow payment of teachers and local government pensioners’ money in the state, stating that records had shown that these were where the money had gone.

However, the police spokesperson in Oyo State, Bisi Clet-Illobanafor stated that only seven of the suspects are in the police custody in respect of the crime adding that the executive secretary went on two-week leave but never returned back to work.

The treasurer, according to her, has retired from service and as at the time of filing this report is in has Saudi Arabia on pilgrimage.