Edo PDP governorship aspirant dragged to EFCC over alleged fraud

A leading governorship aspirant on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party in Edo State, retired General Charles Ehigie Aiwiriavbere, has been dragged before the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission over allegations of fraud.
Aiwiriavbere, a former Army Director of Finance and Administration, was dragged before the EFCC by a human rights activist for allegedly embezzling part of the entitlements of the 27 soldiers that were initially jailed for life for mutiny but had the sentences commuted to discharge from service.

The soldiers, including four women, protested the failure of the Nigerian Army to pay them their full entitlements for their tour of duty in Liberia between 2007 and 2008.
According to the human rights activist who dragged Aiwiriavbere before the EFCC, Shehu Omar Mohammed, the anti-graft agency should investigate allegations that the governorship aspirant knows about the missing money that should have been for the payment of the now discharged soldiers.
Mohammed, in the petition dated February 7, 2012, said in part: “Their (27 soldiers who returned from Liberia without full entitlements) allowances were diverted by some senior military officers who set them up, got them dismissed and tried for mutiny. Whereas, their offences was because they had the effrontery to ask for their well-deserved dues.”
Mohammed said owing to the alleged involvement of Aiwiriavbere in the partial payment of the soldiers, the Nigerian Army heirarchy had to let him go, adding that the general was not properly disengaged from service.
He said: “He was for the acts he committed arrested, detained and eventually sent to Kuru as instructor by General (Azubuike) Ihejieruka.”
Mohammed added: “It is on record that every soldier on the Liberia assignment was due to $1,000 per month.
“They got $600 per month.
“As the Army Director of Finance and Administration (ADAFA), he could not account for $400 per soldier per month.
“Rather, he sacrificed the career and put the family of the 27 soldiers on the line for his own selfish reasons.
“As at July 2011, he was said to have over N5 billion in his private account.”
The 27 soldiers, in making known their grievance after returning from the tour of duty to Liberia in 2008, barricaded the busy Lagos-Ibadan-Abuja highway.
Chairman of the court martial, Brigadier-General Ishaya Bauka, said in sentencing the soldiers to life imprisonment: “From the evidence before us, the court has been convinced that they committed mutiny by protesting against the order of the commanding officer.”
But their counsel, Femi Falana, appealed against the sentences.
Before then, the Army court had convicted four army officers and a soldier of stealing $68,541 from Nigerian troops returning from the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission in Liberia.
The court had ordered that the convicted officers be demoted after they were found guilty of diverting the funds meant for peacekeeping troops to another military unit.
The officers, including a deputy director of finance at army headquarters, paid the soldiers less than the $5,040 each approved by the United Nations, sparking the violent protest.
Those convicted were a serving Commanding Officer of the 72 Army Battalion, Markurdi, Colonel A.A. Awotoye; Lieutenant Colonel Paul Baba; Major A.K. Shonva; Major C.H. Chajoku; and Sergeant Yahaya Umar.
They were convicted for conspiracy and stealing, contrary to the Armed Forces Act.
Mohammed said that as the person at the helms of affairs in the Finance and Administration Department of the Nigerian Army at the time, Aiwiriavbere cannot claim not to know what went on in his department.