The
Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, has declined to
appear before the House of Representatives to testify in the ongoing
investigation into the $43.4m (about N13bn) recovered by the Economic and
Financial Crimes Commission from an apartment at Osborne Towers, Ikoyi, Lagos.
The
House Committee on National Security and Intelligence chaired by an All
Progressives Congress lawmaker from Zamfara State, Mr. Aminu Sani-Jaji, is
conducting the investigation.
Other
sums recovered from the apartment were £27,800 and N23.2m.
The
committee had thrice summoned Emefiele; the suspended Director General of the
National Intelligence Agency, Dr. Ayo Oke; the Acting Chairman of the EFCC, Mr.
Ibrahim Magu; and the National Security Adviser, Maj.-Gen. Babagana Monguno
(retd.) to testify.
The
third sitting of the committee was Wednesday (yesterday).
But,
like in two previous occasions, all the officials shunned the committee on
Wednesday.
However,
Emefiele wrote the lawmakers to say that he did not think it was appropriate
for him to come because he would be in breach of the National Security Agencies
Act.
In
the letter, which was read out to members by Sani-Jaji, the CBN governor argued
that the Act prohibited the disclosure of security information publicly.
He
noted that security information was ‘classified information’, which the law
barred him from releasing to the public.
The
CBN governor further argued that a committee chaired by the Acting President,
Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, had already investigated the cash recovery.
But
the lawmakers were enraged and berated Emefiele for acting like ‘someone who
lacks the capacity to differentiate between a legislature and the executive arm
of government’.
Sani-Jaji
stated, “This CBN governor doesn’t even know that there is something called
separation of powers.”
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