Records relating to Bola Tinubu’s asset declaration with the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) have suddenly disappeared from the storage facility that has held them for years.
According to reports, several offices have been rummaged at the bureau as officials in a desperate bid to produce the documents for EFCC’s use, all to no avail.
Sources disclosed that the bureau started looking for Mr. Tinubu’s asset filings after the EFCC requested copies as part of an ongoing investigation into the former Lagos governor’s financial and material possessions.
“We have searched for the case file everywhere because we want to comply with the lawful request made by the EFCC,” a top management official at the bureau said.
“We have not been able to find the documents either at the main head office or the annex office in Asokoro, said one official familiar with the development.
Another official also disclosed that it is a huge embarrassment and it is dangerous for the image of the bureau.
‘It has become terribly embarrassing and a cause for unending worry at the bureau, which is the primary anti-corruption agency in charge of collecting and keeping assets of scheduled government officials before and after assumption of office.
“We cannot find the asset documents at all,” the official said. “We cannot even find photocopies that we can certify for the EFCC.”
The disappearance could frustrate ongoing corruption investigation into Mr. Tinubu’s asset by the EFCC.
Mr. Tinubu was the governor of Lagos from 1999-2007. Officials said he declared his asset when he assumed office and when he concluded his second term in May 2007.
Anti-graft agencies had previously investigated and charged Mr. Tinubu on the basis of the documents in 2011, but the Code of Conduct Tribunal, which primarily hears cases brought by the bureau, dismissed the matter on technical grounds, leaving the merit of the case floating for nearly a decade. No further charges had been preferred against the ruling party chief ever since.
But as he prepares to seek Nigeria’s presidency in 2023, and the battle for dominance intensifies, it is believe that such trials could damage his reputation and play to the advantage of his opponents, especially with a new sheriff in the EFCC whose allegiance to certain politcal players is beyond conjecture.
Although the EFCC has yet to escalate the disappearance of Mr. Tinubu’s asset filings to the presidency, concerns have nonetheless been flaring amongst top officials of the CCB, an official said. While some officials believed the document might have been stolen by an intruder, others blamed “an inside job” for the development, citing its security.
“Tinubu’s file is one of the VVIP files that is kept with either the chairman or someone he trusts immensely,” an official said. “So claiming that it was stolen from an outsider at the time the EFCC is requesting for it is just so convenient.”
The official said an internal investigation has yet to commence about the disappearance, but the EFCC might be forced to report the CCB, which is a department under the federal cabinet secretary’s office.
“We don’t know how many palms have been oiled to make a sensitive document disappeared from our vault,” the CCB chief said. “We are not going to blame Tinubu for it because he did not come in here to snatch it from us, some people were used.”
The EFCC first wrote to the CCB requesting Mr. Tinubu’s asset declaration details in September, but was forced to repeat the request when the asset fraud office could not produce Mr. Tinubu’s case file.
Since then, the CCB has not been able to comply with EFCC’s request, effectively stalling the case, according to officials at CCB and EFCC.
Although no official memo has been circulated in respect to the charges against Mr. Tinubu, there are strong indications that his infamous bullion vans on the eve of 2019 elections and his involvement in the movement of suspicious funds from Lagos treasury into Alpha-Beta Consulting might be his undoing.
The former Lagos governor has long denied all claims of corruption as a handiwork of his political detractors, and he was even more confident of not facing any charges following his undisputed role in bringing Mr. Buhari to power.
Whereas he expected a great degree of influence under Mr. Buhari’s government, Mr. Tinubu has been left largely disappointed, and, in some cases, deliberately slighted by those with domineering influence on the president.