The suspended chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa, has submitted himself to the Department of State Services, DSS, for questioning a few hours after he was suspended by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
This was confirmed by the agency’s spokesman, Dr. Peter Afunnaya via the DSS’ twitter handle at 10.48 pm on Wednesday, which said that Bawa “arrived for interrogation a few hours ago.”
According to the statement: “The invitation relates to some investigative activities concerning him.”
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Earlier on Wednesday, the office of the Secretary to the Government of Federation (SGF) had said in a statement signed by Mr. Willie Bassey, Director of Information, that the EFCC boss’ suspension resulted from “weighty allegations of abuse of office levelled against him.”
The statement did not give details of the allegations against Bawa, but said that the anti-graft official needed to step aside “to allow for proper investigation into his conduct while in office.”
According to the statement, Bawa has been directed to “immediately hand over the affairs of his office to the Director, Operations in the Commission, who will oversee the affairs of the office of the Chairman of the Commission pending the conclusion of the investigation.”
It said: “President Tinubu has approved the indefinite suspension from office of AbdulRasheed Bawa, CON, as the Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to allow for proper investigation into his conduct while in office. This follows weighty allegations of abuse of office levelled against him.
“Mr Bawa has been directed to immediately handover the affairs of his office to the Director, Operations in the Commission, who will oversee the affairs of the Office of the Chairman of the Commission pending the conclusion of the investigation.”
The development came barely two weeks after a confrontation between the DSS and EFCC over their shared building in Lagos.
DSS operatives had blocked their counterpart EFCC staff members from resuming work in the building in the hours-long stand-off on 30 May.
It took the directive of President Tinubu, who was barely a day old as president, for the DSS operatives to allow EFCC staff to access the building.
Also, last month, the immediate-past governor of Zamfara State, Bello Matawalle, accused Bawa of demanding $2 million as a bribe from him, an allegation denied by the EFCC.
The anti-corruption agency, in May, revealed that Matawalle was being investigated by it for a N70 billion fraud.
Notably, leadership succession at the EFCC since its inception in 2003 has always been steeped in controversies.
For instance, Bawa, in 2001 took assumed duties as the commission’s boss under similar circumstances after his predecessor, Ibrahim Magu, was suspended from office by the immediate former President Muhammadu Buhari, over allegations of corruption.
