A former Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB), Engr. Simbi Wabote, says all the 17 strategic investments undertaken by the board of the agency under his leadership are very successful and progressing except one, contrary to what he described as the deliberate disinformation being fed to the public by some persons he described as disgruntled.

Engr. Wabote, who spoke to THEWILL on Wednesday morning, dismissed reports of his purported arrest by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), saying he honoured the anti-graft agency’s invitation on its investigation into the $35 million equity contribution of the NCDMB into the Energy Infrastructure Park project promoted by Atlantic International Refinery and Petrochemical Limited, whose CEO, Mr Akintoye Adeoye Akindele, is also behind the completed and ready to commission Duport Midstream refinery project in Edo State, where NCDMB is also invested. The Atlantic International Refinery project, which is located in Okpoama Community in Brass LGA of Bayelsa state, is currently stalled because of funding issues on Akindele’s part.

Speaking again on Wednesday afternoon, Wabote, who led the NCDMB between 2016 and 2023, dismissed claims of any misappropriation of funds during his term at the NCDMB.

THEWILL checks revealed that 16 of the 17 projects of the board under his leadership as Executive Secretary are running efficiently with some awaiting official commissioning except the Atlantic International refinery project which currently has financial issues. NCDMB owns 40% of the business. Despite successfully fabricating and completing the refinery in Dubai, Atlantic’s plan to ship it to Bayelsa and complete the project had been hampered by issues between Akindele and his partners in the Duport Midstream refinery, where he had hoped to raise cash from their daily turnover to fund his financial obligation in the project. Akindele and his partners in Dupont are currently in court over their dispute, THEWILL can report.

Though further checks showed that the site for the refinery project including the staff facility, is ready, Atlantic International has been unable to raise more funds to pay off about $700,000 balance owed by the Dubai-based fabricator to facilitate the shipment of the refinery to the site. THEWILL checks also showed that NCDMB and Atlantic International are in talks on the best way to move the project forward.

Wabote, who spoke glowingly of his achievements at the helm of affairs at the agency, declined to comment on our findings on the Atlantic International refinery project because it is now a subject of investigation.

The NCDMB under me got involved in 17 different investments ranging from gas projects to refineries. Out of this 17,16 are progressing and some have been completed. An example is the Watersmith Refinery which made a profit after tax of N23bn in 2023. 30% of this belongs to the NCDMB as a dividend. The refinery is also expanding from 5,000 to 10,000bpd. Hopefully, it will be commissioned by the first quarter of 2025”, he said.

Wabote insists that the NCDMB investments in the business ventures under his tenure are very lucrative and would yield great returns for the agency and the country. “We designed all the projects we invested in, in a way that allows us to cash out in 5 years because our role at the NCDMB is to catalyse these businesses”, he added.

Below are some of the partner projects of the NCDMB.

THE WILL

The FBI has launched a manhunt for suspected Nigerian fraudsters who allegedly swindled Orion, an energy company, of millions of dollars, specifically $60 million, according to Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings on August 10.

Although the SEC withheld the names of the fraudsters and their personal identifying information to avoid spooking them into hiding before their arrest, law enforcement agents told Peoples Gazette that the fraudsters were of Nigerian descent.

The suspects stole $60 million from Orion, a Luxembourg-based company that produces carbon black, a major material for making tyres, ink, batteries, plastics and more.

An SEC filing showed that the suspect targeted an Orion employee in the scheme and used him as bait to make fraudulent wire transfers from the company to other accounts under their control, a criminal tactic that many Nigerian fraudsters have adopted.

“Orion S.A. (the “Company”) determined that a company employee, who is not a named executive officer, was the target of a criminal scheme that resulted in multiple fraudulently induced outbound wire transfers to accounts controlled by unknown third parties,” SEC filing stated on August 10. “As a result of this incident, and if no further recoveries of transferred funds occur, the Company expects to record a one-time pre-tax charge of approximately $60 million for the unrecovered fraudulent wire transfers.”

In a similar scheme, Ramon Abbas, also known as Ray Hushpuppi to his millions of Instagram fans, and his partner Woodberry, whose real name is Olalekan Ponle, were jailed for coordinating multimillion-dollar scams involving business email compromise schemes by the U.S. government.

The two fraudsters are serving their respective sentences at the Fort Dix correctional facility for scamming individuals and companies in similar fraud schemes.

In October, The Gazette reported that the FBI contacted their Nigerian counterpart, EFCC, to track down two fugitives wanted for scamming the American healthcare system of $13 million.

Babatunde Shodiya and Yinka Jamiu targeted at least four Minnesota-based health service providers and tricked them into paying $13 million to a manipulated account rather than the intended beneficiaries.

* The Gazette

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on Thursday, November 7, 2024, presented its second prosecution witness, PW2, Adesola Adeyinka, founder and CEO of Credit PRO Business Limited, in the trial of a couple, Ruth Idowu and Oriyomi Idowu, who are being prosecuted for an alleged N2.7bn fraud before Justice Mojisola Dada of the Special Offences Court sitting in Ikeja, Lagos.

The defendants are facing a 20-count charge bordering on obtaining money by false pretence, money laundering, stealing, retention of stolen property and forgery to the tune of N2,757,188,000.00 (Two Billion, Seven Hundred and Fifty Seven Million, One Hundred and Eighty-eight Thousand Naira Only).

They were arraigned on Tuesday, November 28, 2023 by the Lagos Zonal Directorate of the EFCC alongside Food Commodity Processing Enterprise, Bonway Food Processing Company Limited, Samee Idowu Company Limited and Farmex Integrated Companies Limited, which all belong to Ruth Idowu.

Count one reads: “Ruth Sameeha Idowu, a.k.a. Loiry Ventures, Oriyomi Kabeer Idowu, a.k.a. Yocli Ventures, Food Commodity Processing Enterprise, Bonway Food Processing Company Ltd., Samee Idowu Company Limited, Farmex Integrated Companies Limited, between 31st of March 2022 and 17th of May 2023 in Lagos, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, conspired amongst yourselves by a false pretence that you had a genuine Local Purchase Order (LPO) from various vendors and with intent to defraud, obtained from Creditpro Business Support Services Ltd the sum of N2,757,188,000.00 ((Two Billion, Seven Hundred and Fifty Seven Million, One Hundred and Eighty-eight Thousand Naira Only).”

Another count reads: “Ruth Sameeha Idowu, a.k.a. Loiry Ventures, Oriyomi Kabeer Idowu, a.k.a. Yocli Ventures, Food Commodity Processing Enterprise, Bonway Food Processing Company Ltd, Samee Idowu Company Limited, Farmex Integrated Companies Limited, sometime in 2023 in Lagos, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable court, converted the sum of N10,000,000 to purchase a GLK Benz, purchase sum derived from converting the sum of N500,000,000 belonging to Creditpro Business Support Services with the aim of disguising the illegal origin of the funds.”

At Thursday’s proceedings, Adeyinka told the court that he did not know he was dealing with a fake company.

Led in evidence by prosecution counsel, Zeenat Atiku, he said: ” Exhibit P1 is an e-mail address. After we had our last meeting where we confronted them with the facts, we resolved amicably. And part of the decision reached was that we should stop interest on accruing balance. We agreed that the balance of N526, 340,333 would be paid within the period of six months, with the repayment not less than N50 million.

“I sent this email personally to Mr. Oriyomi Idowu, Ruth Idowu and my team members. Mr. Oriyomi replied, saying, “Duly Noted”.

In his further evidence, he said: “Exhibit P2 is the credit-pro. It was part of the process that payment should go to BUA, which Mrs. Ruth agreed to at the beginning. But she, however, later said it was not advisable and that we should pay to one of the marketing partners. But we didn’t have any reason to doubts her.

“Each time payment was made, we sent e-mail to confirm it. We later got to know that this was being done to mislead us. Mrs. Ruth Appiah Idowu gave us the contacts of the person. But we later realised that they were not real, as they were created to mislead us to think that the fake purchase orders were real. As usual, we confirmed the exhibit P9 given to us by Mrs. Ruth Idowu and sent to the address she gave us. Upon confirmation, we financed it because we believed it was real.”