The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has traced the diversion of the substantial part of the missing $20billion oil cash to the 2015 electioneering campaign of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
The anti-graft agency discovered how the cash was transferred and wired into secret accounts for political purposes.
Former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi (now Emir of Kano
Muhammadu Sanusi II) raised the alarm that there was an estimated $20bn shortfall in oil revenues due to the treasury from the state oil company which might have been spent illegally.
The EFCC latest discovery is said to be part of the ongoing “comprehensive” probe of a former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke.
A source close to the investigator, said:
“We have tracked a substantial part of the missing $20billion about which the former CBN Governor raised the alarm.
“From our findings, the oil money was diverted. We will soon make the details available.
“As for those being invited for interrogation on campaign funds, we have been able to establish that the amounts in question were strictly government funds.
“Whatever noise anyone is making is baseless. We are determined to recover these funds from all the beneficiaries.
“Some of the suspects have refunded the cash credited to them and some still have outstanding funds to pay.”
The highly-placed source said the EFCC was not targeting PDP leaders at all.
He said if there is any evidence of government funds spent on the campaign of other political parties, we will “investigate too”.
In 2014, Sanusi told members of the Senate Committee on Finance at the National Assembly in Abuja that $20billion was missing.
Mrs Alison-Madueke denied that $20billion was missing.
While receiving APC chieftains from Adamawa in April 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari promised to probe the whereabouts of the $20billion.
He said: “Going by the huge sum of money involved, there was no way an APC-led administration that has the fight against corrupt practices as a cardinal objective would sit by and watch some highly placed Nigerians loot the treasury.”
