The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission ,ICPC, has reportedly quizzed the Executive Secretary of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund ,TETFund, Mr. Sonny Echono, over alleged fraud.
The ICPC spokesman, Demola Bakare, made this known on Friday in Abuja.
Bakare disclosed that Echono was invited and detained by the anti-graft agency on Thursday over questionable N7.6 billion project.
In a chat with TheCable, Bakare said Echono is sill in the agency’s custody and investigation is still going into the allegations of fraud.
He said, “The Executive Secretary of TETFund is here with us. He has been invited for questioning. He is still in custody. He was invited yesterday.
“He was invited on Thursday. He has not been released. He’s still with us. Investigation is still ongoing.”
When Daily Intel Newspaper contacted the office of the ES, a top official of the agency who spoke under anonymity for fear of official victimisation debunked the news saying ” it is not true that he was detained”
When the paper further probed on the whereabout of the ES, the official said ” he is in the office as we speak”.
It was later confirmed that the ES and some directors of the Fund were invited for questioning by the ICPC. TETFund would later admitted that they were briefly detained but have been released.
It would be recalled that TETfund awarded two contracts to Fides Et Ratio Academy and Pole Global Marketing (PGM) within two months at the cost of N3.8 billion respectively without the approval of the federal executive council (FEC), which is required for the contract size.
The contract was to provide capacity building course and learning management systems to about 2 million students across higher institutions in the country.
In a rejoinder, TETFund said it did not award N7.6 billion contracts to two companies without due process.
The agency said it was wrong to say they were contracts, whereas they were ICT projects implemented under a memorandum of understanding (MoU) which doesn’t require competitive bidding in public procurement.
TETFund further said its disbursement guidelines were approved by the President on the recommendation of the “Fund’s Board of Trustees and concurrence of the Honourable Minister of Education in line with the TETFund Act 2011″.
In his reaction, Echono said there was no form of irregularity in the N7.6 billion project.
Ochono has been in the news lately on fraud allegations, but he has consistently denied any wrong doing
