The Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF) has dismissed claims that the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC) received public funds or paid salaries to staff, insisting that the council has no operational account with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Speaking over the weekend, the OAGF’s Director of Press and Public Relations, Bawa Mokwa, said not a single kobo had been released to the council because the process of opening its CBN account was never completed.
According to Mokwa, while the convener of the council, Adeniyi Adeyemi, approached the Accountant-General’s Office with an appointment letter and requested the opening of a CBN account, the account could not be activated because the required documentation was never submitted.
“You cannot open an account at the CBN without authorisation from the Accountant-General. The Accountant-General will first authorise the opening of the account,” Mokwa explained.
He disclosed that although the account-opening process was initiated based on the appointment letter presented by Adeyemi, the names of the officials who were to serve as account signatories were never provided, making it impossible for the account to become operational.
“The account, till today, has not seen the light of day. It has not seen one kobo because the account is not completely operational. That portrays that he has not collected a dime. The Accountant-General has not released a dime to him because there is no operational account where such money could be paid,” he said.
Mokwa further stated that the PFIPC has not received any budgetary allocation from the Federal Government, noting that the council is expected to operate under the 2026 budget and has not yet reached the stage where it can receive government funding.
The OAGF spokesman also refuted reports alleging that salaries had been paid to workers of the council, stressing that, to the best of the office’s knowledge, the agency had not employed any staff.
“Based on our knowledge, he has not employed anybody,” he said.
He explained that before any federal agency can recruit personnel and place them on the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) for salary payments, it must first secure approvals from the Federal Character Commission (FCC), the Budget Office of the Federation and the Federal Civil Service Commission (FCSC).
According to him, only after obtaining these approvals can an agency submit the names of its employees to the Office of the Accountant-General for enrolment on the federal payroll.
“If they give you a waiver for 200 people, you take the waiver to these agencies and then present the papers to the Accountant-General. He cannot capture even one name without those approvals because once they are captured, payment will come from the budget,” Mokwa said.
He maintained that none of the statutory requirements for funding or staff recruitment had been completed by the council, making claims that it had received government funds or paid salaries entirely unfounded.