The Office of the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) has disclosed that all names of those involved in BVN fraud have been forwarded to the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) for investigation.
This is coming as a result of a handful of ex-agitators gathered on Tuesday at the premises of the National Assembly to express anger over the stoppage of their monthly N65,000 stipends, which the PAP office said was necessitated by the issues surrounding BVNs.
The former agitators in the oil-rich region raised various issues, alleging that the monthly payment of N65,000 to over 7,000 of them had been stopped since Ndiomu was appointed September last year by the President General Muhammadu Buhari.
The protesters, who said they were from Delta, Rivers, Bayelsa, Ondo and Edo states, said the protest was to register their displeasure with the non-payment.
They urged the leadership of the National Assembly to intervene in the matter.
However, in a swift reaction on Wednesday, Media Aide to the PAP Interim Administrator, Mr. Freston Akpor, affirmed that findings that will emanate from the ongoing investigation into multiple accounts of ex-agitators linked to one BVN, will determine the fate of protesting beneficiaries.
He also blamed bank officials for colluding with these ex-agitators to aid the ‘financial crime’.
According to him, “So the investigation is ongoing and honestly, I must tell you there is nothing the Presidential Amnesty Programme can do now over this matter until the investigation is concluded and then the ONSA will take a decision on what to do.
“This is a financial crime, that is why the ONSA is investigating the matter.
“The policy is one name, one BVN. But in a situation where you have more than 30 names linked to one BVN, it becomes an issue.
“We discovered that 513 names were linked to 1,370 accounts. And these are the people who have cases to answer.
“As it stands those who are protesting are the people who fall within those who have multiple accounts linked to their BVN,” he explained.
On the purported ‘gentleman agreement’ with leaders of the ex-agitators to receive monies in bulk to pay the boys, he said: “It is these same boys, so-called beneficiaries, who have also come to complain that when the money is collected by these so-called leaders, the money doesn’t trickle down to them.”
Vanguard
