Maina and Malami
Fresh
details have emerged of how the embattled former chairman of the
Pension Reform Task Team (PRTT), Abdulrasheed Maina allegedly “arranged”
for his reinstatement and subsequent withdrawal of the court case he
instituted against the Federal Government, with influential individuals
in the office of the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and
Minister for Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN).
Controversy has trailed the alleged
role of the office of the AGF, the Minister for Interior, Abdulrahman
Dambazzau, the chairman of the EFCC, Ibrahim Magu; the Federal Civil
Service Commission (FCSC), Oluremi Joseph Akande; and the Head of
Service of the Federation, Mrs Winifred Oyo-Ita in Maina’s reinstatement
and promotion into the Federal Civil Service, which was approved on
August 16 and completed in October with a rank of Director Grade Level
17 and backdated to February 21, 2013.
However, it has emerged that much of the
work, including the recommendation to get President Muhammadu Buhari to
use his “presidential directive” to effect Maina’s reinstatement was
done in the office of the AGF. The office had initiated the move for
Maina’s recall after he was reported to have made some visits and
tendered the court cases he had instituted challenging his disengagement
from the civil service.
The presentation by the dramatis
personae in the saga including the Director-General of the Department of
State Services (DSS), Mamman Daura; the Commandant of the Nigerian
Immigration Service (NIS), Muhammed Babandede at Thursday’s sitting of
the House of Representatives ad-hoc committee investigating the
disappearance, reappearance, reinstatement and promotion of Maina,
including admission by the AGF on how he arrived at the opinion he
proffered for his reinstatement, has further exposed the irregularity in
the process.
The AGF tendered copies of the memo
generated from his office, which played a pivotal part in Maina’s
reinstatement and promised that he has set up an internal probe into how
one of his Special Assistants arrived at the memo to convince him “as
to how the effect of judgment provided by Maina could have a coessential
effect on reinstatement which was not developed and presented.”
Sources said Maina had on such
visits to the ministry between February and May, 2017, which was a
follow-up of his earlier meeting with the AGF outside the country,
presented the various suits he initiated and the opinion of his lawyer,
Mahmud Magaji (SAN) that his query and dismissal for abscondment despite
the pendency and eventual order voiding the warrant by Justice Adamu
Bello in suit No: FHC/CV/65/2013 before an Abuja Federal High Court, was
subjudice and amounted to contempt of court.
His lawyer suggested that the action
negated the principle that once a matter has been placed within the
domain of the court, no action shall or ought to be taken by any party
thereto to debase or in any way undermine the outcome of the court’s
intervention.
Maina thus contended that the action
sacking him from the Federal Civil Service was taken without given him
fair hearing more so as he was forced into hiding because of the warrant
of arrest issued by the Senate Committee on Establishment to the
Inspector General of Police and an attempt on his life by some unknown
assailants traceable to persons who felt threatened by “the fraud of
monumental proportion” he discovered in the country’s pension system.
Maina further explained to the aides
of the AGF that he also initiated suit no: NICN/ABJ/68/2013 before the
Industrial Court in Abuja challenging the action of the Head of Service
of the Federation and Ministry of Interior in the query dated February
15, 2013 which cited him for serious misconduct offending Public Service
Rules 030301 to 0303014 for his abscondment from duty following a
warrant of arrest by the police and demanding the sum of N2.5 billion in
damages.
He explained that Justice Adamu
Bello of the Federal High Court in Abuja on March 27, 2013 held that the
warrant of arrest was a nullity and that the procedure adopted by the
Senate was not valid based on the powers of the National Assembly in
sections 88 and 89 of the Constitution because he was not given fair
hearing.
After Maina’s presentations, on
April 27, 2017 a legal assistant to Malami, produced the said memo
detailing why the AGF acting within his powers in Section 174 of the
Constitution, should re-emphasize his advice to the FCSC to give
consequential effect to the judgment of the Federal High Court. The aide
suggested also that the AGF can “weight advisory to the president to
issue a Presidential Directive to the FCSC to reinstate Maina to his
normal position and full rights and privileges.”
Earlier, the AGF had in a letter
with reference no: HAGF/FCSC/2017/Vol.1/2 dated February 21, 2017 where
he gave an interpretation that the judgment of the Federal High Court in
2013 voided the warrant of arrest “issued by the police against Dr
Abdulrasheed Maina, which warrant of arrest formed the basis for the
query referenced MI/30040/1/1 dated the 15th day of February, 2013 and
his eventual dismissal from the service of the Federal Government of
Nigeria on the 5th day of March 2013.”
In the memo titled: ‘Complaint of
illegal dismissal and appeal for reinstatement of Dr Abdulrasheed Maina
to his office, demand for update of the reinstatement of Dr Abdulrasheed
Maina as Director in the Federal Civil Service’, the said SA also
submitted that recalling Maina would be in public interest because it
would give hope to other civil servants who have similar experience like
Maina.
He said Maina has a lot of
experience in pension administration that can be tapped, adding that he
can be used as prosecution witness for the EFCC and ICPC in the pending
cases of pension scam in various courts.
“That as head when the fraud of
monumental proportion was discovered and a huge sum of stolen funds
reportedly recovered under his watch and given the fact he must have
reported some government officials to agencies like EFCC and ICPC and
strike a deal to act as prosecution witness in most of the cases under
investigation,” the SA wrote in the memo.
Satisfied the process was in place,
Maina agreed to withdraw the suit before the National Industrial Court
in Abuja where he had demanded “an order quashing the entire steps taken
by the Head of Service of the Federation on the dismissal of the
claimant.”
Based on the application by Maina’s
lawyers formally withdrawing the suit, Justice Olufunke Anowe on
November 8 struck it out from the court’s records.
However, sources alleged many
“issues” played a major role in the official advice and the purported
letter from the office of the AGF to the FCSC for Maina’s reinstatement.
Thus, the AGF at the House hearing on Thursday promised that he had
directed the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry to probe the memo and
the letter to the FCSC to unravel what really transpired and he would
report back to the House.
“When this controversy arose, I
instructed the Permanent Secretary taken into consideration my earlier
K.I.V. of a letter dated 5th October, that they should initiate process
to now unravel what truly transpired if indeed those letters have
actually emanated from the Federal Ministry of Justice and what indeed
transpired. I can assure you I can ask them to expedite action for
that,” he said.
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