Tinubu’s presidency orders probe into fake agency allegations

The Presidency has asked the security agencies and the anti-graft agencies to arrest and prosecute government officials believed to have been in collusion with Prince Matthew Adeniyi Adeyemi in the running of two fake Federal Government Agencies.

It is alleged that Adeyemi ran the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council and the Presidential Economic Advisory Council with fraudulent documents purportedly issued by the Presidency.

In a statement on his verified X account, the Senior Special Assistant to President Bola Tinubu on Media and Publicity, Temitope Ajayi, asked for investigations that should not only be limited to Adeyemi but also those public officials behind the operation of the alleged fraud for such a long time.

Ajayi urged the DSS, NPF, and EFCC to carry out investigations into those public officials within the various government establishments who might have aided and abetted Adeyemi.

According to Ajayi, most of the discussions on the matter have failed to realize the fact that it was the various government establishments which discovered and reported the alleged fraud.

Ajayi disclosed that it was officials of the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission in collaboration with officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs who first noticed the alleged fraud and reported it.

“Contrary to the anything-goes narrative being promoted, it was the system itself that raised the red flag and dealt with it administratively,” Ajayi said.

However, he maintained that Adeyemi could not have sustained the alleged operation without assistance from insiders.

“What is not in doubt is that internal collaborators enabled Adeyemi to get this far. That is precisely what investigators from the DSS, the Police and the EFCC must now unravel.

“The criminal network within the affected institutions must be dismantled and everyone found to have played a role should be arrested and prosecuted,” he added.

The Presidency had earlier disowned the two organisations, insisting that they do not exist as agencies of the Federal Government.

It also reiterated that the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, neither authorised Adeyemi’s activities nor had any connection with the alleged organisations.

Ajayi accused Adeyemi of attempting to implicate Gbajabiamila as a diversionary tactic to deflect attention from the criminal allegations against him.

“In Nigeria, the easiest and most believable allegation anyone can throw at a public officer is corruption.

“Once that accusation is thrown into the mix, the water is polluted, the lines are blurred and everyone is kept busy arguing over distractions rather than the real issues,” he wrote.

He described Adeyemi as “an irredeemable con artist,” alleging that his accusations against the Chief of Staff represented a desperate attempt to avoid criminal liability.

The Presidency maintained that the matter should be viewed as an alleged fraud uncovered by government institutions rather than evidence of complicity at the highest levels of government.