A department and a unit of the Nigeria Police Force: the Force Criminal Investigation Department and Intelligence Response Team, have been accused of N6 million extortion by a Bureau De Change operator, Chinedu Ngwaka, in a case in which a Branch Manager of Access Bank PLC was fingered.
This was brought to the attention of the public by the Rule of Law and Accountability Advocacy Centre via a petition to the Senate.
According to the petition addressed to Senator Neda Usman, the Chairman, Senate Committee on Ethics, Code of Conduct and Public Petitions, RULAAC demanded a probe into the activities of some police personnel and operatives of the EFCC.
The petition, signed by the Executive Director of RULAAC, Okechukwu Nwanguma, said that the issue borders on the integrity of national institutions and the image of Nigeria.
Nwanguma explained that RULAAC resorted to petitioning the Senate because the agencies of government involved in the issue: Nigeria Police and EFCC, have not demonstrated genuine sincerity to diligently and effectively investigate many previous petitions from different sources on the serial involvement of the same characters in Foreign Exchange fraud to bring the perpetrators and their collaborators to account and guarantee remedy for the many victims.
He further explained that the petition was on the existence of what appears like a fraud syndicate involving one Eboh and associates suspected to operate in cahoots with some “unscrupulous law enforcement operatives and units within the Nigeria Police and the EFCC who benefit from her serial crimes, and compromise and derail investigation to shield her and assist her evade justice while her victims are not only denied justice but further victimised”.
Ngwaka, a Bureau d’change operator based in Lagos, alerted RULAAC to this issue.
He informed RULAAC that he has been trading in dollars and assisting his customers in accessing FOREX for their international trade and importation of goods.
He had been doing this business for many years without any problem until he ran into a woman he simply identified as Mrs. Eboh, who fronts a certain nongovernmental organisation as well as some other companies.
Nwanguma said: “A branch manager at Access Bank in Anambra State linked him up to the said Mrs. Eboh. He and Eboh started doing this business.
“He would give her Naira, and she would credit him in dollars, and this was going on smoothly until the last transaction that went awry.
“The money involved in this transaction leading to his being defrauded by Mrs Eboh is over N3,000,000,000 from different customers who are now on his neck. Unknown to him, Mrs. Eboh already had some pending cases of alleged telex fraud with the EFCC.
“He has another business partner, Uchenna Echendu, who is also being dragged by his customers at EFCC over the same bitter experience with Mrs Eboh.
“When Mrs Eboh sent him Telex for the last transaction, he forwarded the same to his customers/creditors as usual, but this time, it turned out to be fake.
“His customers started complaining and asking why he sent them fake telex, and he was shocked at this unexpected development.
“He brought this development to the attention of Mrs. Eboh and sought explanations, but she was unable to provide any meaningful explanation, nor would she ensure the correction of the problem.
“When it dawned on him that he had been defrauded and now in trouble with his clients – creditors, he moved to locate Mrs Eboh in Abuja, where she operates from.
“He lodged criminal complaints of fraud against her at the EFCC and the Nigeria Police Intelligence Response Team (IRT), Abuja.
“By this time, his customers whose money had been stuck became impatient and began to worry him asking for their money to be returned to them.
“Following his complaint to the IRT, Mrs. Eboh was arrested by operatives of the IRT Abuja, detained and released after four days.
“He said the IRT investigators told him that Mrs. Eboh had promised to pay back the money in a few weeks.
“While Mrs Eboh was yet to fulfil her undertaking to refund the money, the IRT operatives invited him to come and explain the sources of the money and how he sent them.
“He strongly suspects that the investigation team may have compromised the investigation and appear to have turned him from a complainant into the accused by turning their focus of the investigation into questioning him about the source of the funds and how he sent the money, all of which were already explained in his complaint against the suspect, Mrs Eboh.
“One Femi, one of the IRT operatives in the investigation team, is claiming that Mrs. Eboh is hospitalised and at the intensive care unit.”
Ngwaka also told RULAAC that one of his clients, Tochukwu Unachukwu, whose money is involved in the transaction, lost his patience and decided to complain to the FCID Annexe, Alagbon, Lagos, alleging that he used the money he paid into his account for FOREX to buy a Hilux truck.
RULAAC added: “This prompted his arrest by operatives from Alagbon, whom he told, during his interrogation, about his predicament in the hands of Mrs. Eboh and that he had pending petitions against her at the IRT Abuja, the EFCC and later with the IGP Monitoring Unit, Abuja, all in his desperation to get the woman to return his clients’ money with her.”
Ngwaka denied the allegation of using the complainant’s money to buy a Hilux truck and stated that he had bought his Hilux truck far back in February 2024 before the extant transaction happened.
Despite his explanations to the investigators at Alagbon, including informing them about his prior petition and pending cases at the IRT, Abuja, the investigators at Alagbon focused on the allegation that he used the complainant’s money to buy a Hilux truck, ignoring his explanation and did not bother to reach out to the IRT to ascertain the extent of their investigation and the possibility of harmonising the different case files.
The investigators at Alagbon, after profiling him and obtaining his statement, froze his account and his wife’s account and confiscated his Hilux, which is currently kept at the station premises.
The operatives later extorted the sum of N3 million from him, which they made him transfer through a Point of Sale operator who was called into the station by the operatives before they granted him bail.
He was leaving the FCID Alagbon premises after being forced to transfer N3 million for bail when he was re-arrested at the gate on the claim by the same operatives that another complaint had been lodged against him by another client whose money was also involved in the transaction.
He was taken back into custody and asked to arrange for another surety to take him on bail for the second complaint against him.
He was made to transfer another N3 million for bail, bringing the total sum extorted from him to a total of N6 million.
A National Human Rights Commission official informed RULAAC that some hours after he visited the FCID Alagbon to verify the N6 million extortion claim, FCID Alagbon paraded Ngwaka in the media, labelling him a fraudster.
The National Human Rights Commission believes that parading him as a fraudster over baseless allegations against him still under investigation is prejudicial to his constitutional rights to a fair hearing and the presumption of innocence and that it was done in retaliation for his revealing the fact that he was extorted of N6m for bail.
While the IRT appears to have compromised the investigation into Ngwaka’s complaint against Mrs. Eboh, some of his clients (creditors) have lodged complaints against him at FCID Alagbon, prompting his arrest, detention, and extortion before granting him bail, freezing his account and his wife’s account, confiscating his vehicle, and later publicly parading and labelling him a fraudster.
Ngwaka said that he was distraught that all this had happened to him despite his providing evidence to the investigators that every single money that entered his account in respect of his transaction with Mrs Eboh was promptly transferred into Mrs Eboh’s account, yet, the police looked away, refused to see the facts and evidence, and ended up collecting bribe of a total of N6,000,000 from him twice for bail and are still saying they will charge him to court.
Nwanguma said that RULAAC had received a previous similar complaint of alleged fraud involving this same Mrs. Eboh.
The activist said: “The same manager in a branch of Access Bank in Anambra State aforementioned also introduced his female colleague to this same Mrs Eboh as a reliable FOREX dealer.
“The female banker, confident that the contact came from her manager in her bank, trusted him collected over N300 million from her customers, and gave to Mrs. Eboh to deliver the dollar equivalent. She suddenly disappeared with the whole money to date.
“The female banker lost her pregnancy and has been depressed ever since.
“She has also contemplated suicide and has been sick. Some of her customers have also lodged reports against her at Zone 13 Police Zonal Command, Ukpo, where she had been invited many times, detained, made to pay for her bail, and suffered a lot of ordeal.
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“We are gravely concerned about the persistent fraud and unchecked operations.
“Mrs Eboh’s alleged fraudulent activities span several years, during which she has repeatedly been accused of defrauding individuals and businesses, including a $2 million scam reported in 2019, a N2 billion fraud case for which she was arraigned by the EFCC in 2018 and countless other alleged fraudulent schemes, yet no significant actions have been taken to halt her alleged criminal operations.
“We are also concerned about compromise of law enforcement. In the case of the female banker in Anambra State, Mrs. Eboh was initially arrested by IRT operatives in Abuja but was subsequently granted bail under questionable circumstances similar to Ngwaka’s case under reference, facilitated by individuals with whom she maintains personal and business relations.
“Allegations of bribery and corruption within the EFCC and the Police, particularly involving certain identified operatives, have further compounded the challenges faced by the victims in seeking justice.
“We are concerned about the complicity of associates. Mrs Eboh’s alleged accomplices, including her husband and others who facilitated her bail in some previous cases and suspected received some portions of the stolen funds through her company, continue to remain uninvestigated and unprosecuted.
“These individuals are believed to be integral to the fraud scheme, receiving and laundering funds on behalf of Mrs Eboh. These allegations, including the alleged collusion of some EFCC and police operatives in benefiting from serial crime, derailing and compromising investigations to shield the culprit from justice, are weighty and scandalous.
“They have serious implications for the integrity and public perception of both the EFCC and the Police. RULAAC calls on the Senate Committee to conduct a comprehensive and effective investigation into the numerous fraud allegations by different complainants against this same Mrs Eboh and her accomplices, as well as the role and involvement of some identified operatives and units within the two agencies in compromising investigations, benefiting from her crimes, shielding her from prosecution, and in some cases twisting investigations to further victimize the complainants and deny them justice.
“We request the Committee to require the Inspector-General of Police and the Chairman of the EFCC to avail the senate of reports of investigations they have carried out on the numerous petitions from different sources against the same Mrs Eboh.
“We call on the Senate, in particular, to order a review of the basis for freezing the bank accounts of Mr Chinedu Ngwaka and his wife, the confiscation of his vehicle, and the extortion of the sum of N6m from him by operatives at the FCID Alagbon, to order the unfreezing of the accounts, the release of the vehicle, and refund of the extorted money, and appropriate disciplinary actions against those involved in corrupt practices. This matter should be impartially investigated to ensure remedies for the victims and accountability for the perpetrators.”
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