Abdulrasheed Maina The embattled former chairman of the Presidential Pension Task Team, Abdulrasheed Maina, has said that his reinstatement was ordered by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Maina, who is wanted for alleged corruption, disclosed this in a video aired by Channels TV on Monday, November 27, 2017.
It
had been revealed in October that Maina was secretly reinstated into
the civil service after he was sacked two years ago for allegedly
misappropriating about N1 billion pension fund.
The revelation outraged many Nigerians, who called into question the ongoing anti-corruption war of the Buhari government.
Amid the scandal, the President ordered
Maina's immediate disengagement from service and directed that his
recall is investigated.
Some of the government officials who were accused of playing major roles in Maina's recall, including the Head of Service, Mrs. Winifred Oyo-Ita, quickly denied involvement in the matter.
In the video, Maina suggested that Buhari knew about his recall all long, stressing that the President ordered it.
He said, "The
letter of dismissal, I didn’t even receive a letter. It was when I
heard about it (that) my lawyers went to court. They took the Senate to
court and the court quashed whatever was the report of the Senate. The
court also removed all the warrant of arrest. The court upheld that I
should return to work. That was in April 2013. But the last
administration refused to take me back to my job. They refused to obey
the court order. The Head of Service was asked not to return me to the
office. The Federal Civil Service Commission chairperson at that time
did not want me to return to office.
"Now
I did not return to office but when this government came in, the
president gave his note that go and sit down with Maina, I’ve given you
the approval. They sat down with me after the security agencies cleared
me of any wrong doing."
He said he has never been sued in any court of law for any allegation.
"Nobody
has ever taken me to court in Nigeria. I want Nigerians to know. I have
never been taken to any court of law. Nobody has ever sued me for
anything. I’ve never been taken to any court of law.
"I
have sued all the security agencies that we are talking about and I
have won. I have full court judgements. They place my name on INTERPOL, I
went to court and removed it. They did this, I did this I removed it.
There is nothing they have not done. Even the one they could not do,
they went to immigration, put my name on no fly list. I went to the
airport. I was in Nigeria, that was in 2015. I went to the court, the
court granted me N2 million damages for not flying that day," he said.
Maina explained how he helped the government recover N1.3 trillion through the AGF.
He added that the process of his reinstatement started after the Attorney General visited him.
He added, "As
soon as this present government decided to sit with me, and after
sitting with, me, I told them I will not leave you to go back to Nigeria
without something in your pocket. I’m going to give you something in
your pocket and the Minister laughed. The Minister of Justice said what
are you going to give us as gift? I gave him a document, I say go here,
here, here, there's N1.3 trillion they are going to steal it because
they’ve been stealing every year. He was shocked, he said not possible. I
said sir, with all due respect, could you please try it, this is a gift
I’m giving you. I haven’t gotten to Nigeria, I’m just giving you a
gift. I say try it for you to understand where I’m coming from.
"I’m
not a saint but I try as much as I can to help the system. The minister
thought that won’t be possible, when he got back, he realised I gave
him a correct information. Now, after giving him this information, he
asked me, when are you coming back, I said I will soon be back. I said I
have a court order. So, I asked my lawyer to write a petition. He now
wrote a petition to government and the Minister set up a committee to
look at the petition. They looked at the petition and recommended that
this is a court order that there’s no question of going back on it,
nobody has appealed it since 2013 so government must obey it.
"So,
he sent a letter to the Federal Civil Service Commission to say this is
the petition I got in my office, I’m attaching the court order which
you must respect. I’m hearing people are saying he’s directing people to
reinstate me. No, he said you must respect the court order, this is the
court order because he is the chief officer of the country. Now, the
document was taken to the Federal Civil Service Commission. I went to
the Federal Civil Service Commission, they told me they have just
received the documents, they are going to see me later and we have a
meeting. After that meeting, they wrote office of the head of service.
They say we want you to sit down with your Senior Staff Committee and
after that you send it to the Ministry of Interior; that was used at
that time because they were coerced which I later found out. The Senior
Staff Committee was coerced by the then Head of Service, Mr. Isa Bello
Sanni to make sure they send me out and packing because I had stopped
the inflow of 5.2 billion monthly to the office of the Head of Service."
Presidential aide, Femi Adesina was said to have declined comment when he was asked about the allegation that Buhari ordered Maina's reinstatement.
He was quoted as saying that "Anything on that issue, get in touch with the AGF."
But the AGF was not immediately available to comment on the allegation.
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