The Integrity Youth Alliance, an organisation monitoring the development trends in the Nigeria Police Force for over 15 years, has said there is no iota of truth in the post made on X by one Jackson Ude @jacksonpbn titled “IGP EGBETOKUN LINKED WITH A N125BILLION FRAUD, PETITION SEEKS TINUBU’S INTERVENTION.”
Responding to the X Message, the Director of Publicity of the Alliance, Danjuma Lamido, said that contrary to Jackson Ude’s publication, it is not about the Ikeja Police Cantonment concession but that of the Nigerian Army Shopping Complex—the Arena at the Ikeja Cantonment, Lagos.
“Seeing people continually cast Egbetokun’s name in the garbage with unfounded allegations is disheartening. He is incapable of the allegations being levelled against him, Lamido said.
“To set the record straight and from our discreet investigations, the Inspector General of Police directed the Force Intelligence Department, Police Headquarters, Abuja, to investigate how several banks were fraudulently manipulated together with some army officers to cleverly divert the sum of N692,122,000 from the accounts of a company, Woods Resources Limited, in Lagos.
“The investigation followed allegations that a minority shareholder of Woods Resources Limited and one other person (names withheld), over the past thirteen years with the support of some senior Army Officers, forcefully took over the management of The Nigeria Army Complex upon its completion and pushed out its substantive Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, James Onyemenam.
“Based on this, James Onyemenam went to court in 2011 to seek legal redress, and it was discovered that the duo did not stop at that but also went ahead to fraudulently manipulate the different bank accounts of the company by purportedly removing James Onyemenam, the majority shareholder and the signatory A, leaving the minority shareholder and signatory B as the sole signatory, and this has become the subject of investigations by the police and the EFCC.
“It was learned that Mr. Onyemenam, on his own volition, reported to the police department but found the handling of the trumped-up charges quite concerning and therefore counter-petitioned the IGP and filed complaints on the questionable manner in which the investigation was being handled.
“IGP Egbetokun, in his wisdom and professional handling of the matter, transferred the investigation to the Force Intelligence Department.
“The investigations have been far-reaching, leading to findings implicating several fraudulently manipulated banks and many senior Army Officers.
“To further enlighten the ignorance of Arc James Onyemenam, before a case file is transferred for prosecution, a case file must include a detailed account of the facts discovered during the investigation; names of the complainant, suspects, and investigators; nature of the complaint, the time and place of the crime, and the time and place of the report; an inventory of any exhibits recovered and finally, the case file must be organized into sections with headings and sub-headings and all these must be done before the case file is handed over to the the Attorney General of the Federation.
“Therefore, publication by Jackson Ude is mischievous, unfounded and tissues of lies, as there are over 87 bank accounts currently under investigation and consequently legally frozen for obvious reasons and neither the IGP nor the investigating police team is poised not to allow themselves to be cowed or blackmailed into abandoning the long drawn investigation bearing in mind that the victim has sought justice for over a decade and despite efforts by other law enforcement agencies, he got no respite until he reached out to the police.
“In addition to exposing such careless fabrications, the Nigeria Police should prosecute other dishonest players who aim to discredit the Inspector General of Police’s position, the statement concluded.
