in the Ministry of Aviation and Federal Aviation Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) as it alleged that
$76 million Bilateral Air Service Agreement (BASA) funds have grown wings and flew away.
The group in an online statement sent to African Examiner accused Mrs Stella Odua, the
minister of aviation and the Managing Director of FAAN, Mr. George Uriesi of complicity in the
disappearance of the funds.
According to the group, a petition in respect of the scam has been submitted to the Economic
and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for investigation and prosecution.
“Under the law, the procedure for accessing and spending from the Bilateral Air Service
Agreement (BASA) fund required that any expenses from this fund must be budgeted in the
annual budget, appropriated by the National Assembly and approved by Mr. President.
“Unfortunately, since the resumption of Mrs. Stella Oduah and Mr. George Uriesi as Minister of
Aviation and Managing Director of FAAN respectively, this has not been done.
“Today, over $76million and another $13million have been diverted to various projects without
following due process and the laid down procedures in the Bureau for Public Procurement Act.
These contracts were neither publicly advertised nor contained in any of the Federal
Government’s Tenders & Procurement bulletins.” the group stressed.
- The petition states thus:
- "As at 2006, the BASA fund held in the CBN was $86,202,875.02 however by 2010 this amount had dropped to $76 million. The unfortunate thing is that between 2010 and April 2012, the $76 million fund had simply vanished. Rather than apply the money to verifiable physical projects, the money is being shared and used to pay for unbudgeted pseudo claims, expenses and unapproved projects. For instance in February 2010 or thereabout $6 million out of the balance standing to the credit of the BASA fund was claimed to have been used to pay Hydro Air Cargo for damages to its aircraft when it landed at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in November 2003. The real truth however is that this money was only taken out using Hydro Air Cargo as an excuse for the money to be shared by the Managing Director of FAAN and top officials of the Ministry of Aviation.
- "In order to confirm the veracity of this petition, the SFU is urged to investigate into the following:1. Why was the claim by Hydro Air Cargo for the damage to its aircraft not referred to FAAN’s insurer by the management of FAAN for settlement?2. Has FAAN not been paying its insurance premium to allow it enjoy full indemnity for the accident of Hydro Air Cargo?
4. Request for all documents relating to the claims made that $6 million was paid to Hydro Air
Cargo
5. Investigate the account into which the payment was supposedly paid and to also investigate
the persons directly involved in the transaction. Note how the $6million was “share” once it
entered into Hydro Air Cargo Account.
DIVERSION OF NEW MONIES AMOUNTING TO $80MILLION
"Now that the $76million has been diverted and spent, the Federal Ministry of Aviation has now
devised a new method to further divert and spend all the current BASA income of over $80
million received from the foreign airlines operating into Nigeria. For instance the recent
payments by airlines such as Lufthansa, British Airways, Emirates etc amounted to over $80
million are now being diverted. This alarming situation of complete depletion of the BASA fund
without any appropriation from the National Assembly or approval from the Presidency or
Federal Executive Council or Bureau for Public Procurement is worrisome. We therefore call on
the SFU to avert this dangerous trend from continuing.
"The SFU is invited to conduct an investigation into how all the money received from the 25
international airlines that paid BASA fees between 2010 and April 2012 were diverted during
the stewardship of Mrs. Fidelia Njeze and the present Minister of Aviation, Mrs. Stella Oduah.
This fund which included about $13.5million paid by Lufthansa as contained in a letter from the
Ministry of Aviation reference FMA/ATMD/501/S.I/104/XI/1153, $12 million paid by British
Airways and various amounts paid by the other airlines all totaling over $80million were spent
and diverted into various fictitious accounts under the guise that there is a Presidential
approval for the spending of BASA fund.
"Again, the Agency is invited to investigate the actual amounts invoiced to and paid by these
airlines as well as the accounts into which all these BASA fees were paid, how these fund was
appropriated and the approvals obtained for appropriation - the BASA fund had been
converted for both capital and recurrent expenditure against the approval guidelines for the
management of the fund. All they do is issue payment to any of these contractors without
following due process and then share the proceed with the company.
"Furthermore, there is a need for the SFU to investigate how the Federal Ministry of Aviation
was able to divert the BASA fund which ought to have been paid to and managed by the
NCAA. The Federal Ministry of Aviation is now very powerful to be able to divert monies into
any account it feels like, using FAAN accounts and fictitious FAAN projects.
SHARING OF THE LOOT
"Having successfully gained access to the BASA fund, the Honorable Minister of Aviation
seemed to have perfected acts of sharing the loot. Instead of using the BASA fund to develop
the industry, money in the BASA account simply found its way into private bank accounts of
contractors and the accounts of some parastatals under the Federal Ministry of Aviation,
particularly that of FAAN. An example is the N3 Billion out of the BASA amount that was paid
into FAAN HQ Main Account No. 1012771229 at Zenith Bank on February 8, 2012. This yielded
an interest of about N420 Million which was not appropriately credited to any FAAN Account but
was fraudulently shared by the MD of FAAN, Hajia Nana Aliyu - 08037874204 (Ag. Director of
Finance & Account), a Director in Zenith by named Mr. Peter Amangbo, and other persons.
"The N3 Billion was placed in an interest yielding deposit account, but cunningly put in the
Current Account to deceive innocent looker. This fact can be easily confirmed since the N3
Billion that was put in the Zenith Account no. 1012771229 in February 2012 still remain so till
today without interest accruals. This is not surprising, as it has been an established practice in
FAAN to keep money in interest yielding accounts only for such interests to be diverted into the
private accounts of top executives of the parastatal. FAAN is used to under declaring interest
income for example in 2010 FAAN placed N1.7billion in Zenith Bank Plc Account no.
6011520927 where accrued interest was understated and the proceeds shared by senior
officials including the erstwhile Managing Director, the former Director of Finance & Account
and immediate past Director of Airport Operations now Managing Director, Mr. George Uriesi.
"A further check confirmed that this N3 Billion was used by the Honorable Minister of Aviation,
Mrs. Stella Oduah, to secure a loan from Zenith Bank to buy a Ship for the operations of Sea
Petroleum & Gas, her company. This is a great abuse of office!
MISAPPROPRIATION OF CONSTRUCTION AND MAINTENANCE FUND
"FAAN maintained an Account they referred to as Construction and Maintenance Account. This
Account is used to warehouse monthly allocations to all the 22 Airports in the country. The
Account is maintained at Finbank Nig Plc now FCMB Plc and a total of over N3.3Billion was
transferred to the Account from Lagos operations alone from January 2008 to April 2012.
However, the usage of this funds remains questionable as it is a general knowledge that the
Airports are greatly rundown and cry for allocations to run the Airports which accounts for the
decayed infrastructure at the Airports.
"It is on record that the Murtala Muhammed Airport generated as much as N43 Billion in the 5
years between 2008 and 2012, one would however expect that 10% of these amount would be
set aside for maintenance of this airport. It is sad to note that moneys earmarked for
maintenance of airports are taken out and misappropriated. There is no better way to describe
the level of corruption in FAAN that has affected airports maintenance than in the words of Mr.
Edward Olarerin the Airport Manager of Murtala Muhammed International Airport who said: ‘It
will be very wrong for me to say there is no corruption at the Murtala Muhammed International
Airport. We generate so much but we don't get this money. It is frustrating for me when I cannot
produce what I generate at MMIA……. Corruption is also exhibited among the lower cadre of
staff; it affects every hierarchy’ quoted in Thisday Newspaper of 17 June 2010."
The petition was signed by Sulaiman Kazeem National Co-coordinator of the organization.
AfricanExaminer
No comments:
Post a Comment