The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has arrested one Emmanuel Eneji for falsely claiming to be a former employee of the defunct Nigeria Airways.
In a statement made available to our source through the commission’s spokesperson, Rasheedat Okoduwa, it said Mr Eneji was arrested at the Ministry of Finance, Abuja.
According to the statement, the Ministry of Finance is the venue of the Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit (PICA) where all ex-staff of the non-operational agency have been presenting themselves for verification.
President Muhammadu Buhari recently approved the payment of owed emoluments to the ex-workers of the airways and the process is ongoing.
The ICPC in the statement said the alleged impostor claimed to have worked as operations manager of the Airways in Ghana and had presented a verification slip that belonged to another.
But checks on his documents and other findings uncovered him to be an impostor, the agency said, as insiders familiar with the operations of the defunct airways told investigators that the position of operations manager in Ghana never existed.
The statement added that when further probed on the authenticity of his claim, Mr Eneji claimed that he lost his Nigeria Airways Staff Identity Card, including employment letter, letter of promotion from Grade Level 09 to 10 and his letter of disengagement as well as his academic certificates in a fire incident during the Zango Kataf uprising in 1993, at Malali, Kaduna State.
Meanwhile, the only document in his possession linking him to the non-operational airways was a photocopy of the Nigeria Airways Training School Certificate.
According to the statement, the suspect also claimed to have used a police report and an affidavit for the lost documents to scale through the verification exercise in Lagos, which enabled him to obtain a verification slip and a bio-data form from PICA.
He further claimed that one Mr Ajayi, a staff of the Nigeria Airways Union, issued him the verification number on the list of staff to be verified, that belonged to another person upon the presentation of police report and the affidavit.
“Investigation on the matter continues and the suspect will be charged to court upon conclusion,” the statement added.
