Fani-Kayode, Adesina (NGE) Implicated In DasukiGate | Received N1.7bn, N50m Respectively

 Former Minister of Aviation, Femi Fani-Kayode, is currently under the investigation of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over N1.7 billion slush fund he received as the campaign’s media director during the 2015 general elections.

The investigation, according to SaharaReporters, was prompted by a petition sent to the EFCC by some former staffers of the former President Goodluck Jonathan’s campaign organization alleging Fani-Kayode received N1.7 billion from embattled former National Security Adviser (NSA), Sambo Dasuki. They even provided evidence against him.

READ ALSO: $2.1bn Arms Deal: Olisa Metuh Spends First Night In EFCC Cell |N1.4bn Traced To Coy

Recall, Fani-Kayode was the PDP presidential campaign media director during the 2015 presidential election.
A source in the administration of Jonathan, disclosed to Sahara Reporters that Fani-Kayode directly got the N1.7billion from Jonathan through Dasuki. The source said Fani-Kayode took the money as the spokesman for Jonathan’s Presidential campaign.
The report stated that shortly after he received the cash, Fani-Kayode acquired several SUVs, including one for his sexy girlfriend, Precious Chikwendu.
According to the source at the EFCC, their investigators had traced a substantial amount of illicit funds to Mr. Fani-Kayode. The source disclosed that the former Jonathan spokesman worked hard to avoid leaving paper trails that could lead investigators to him, adding, specifically, that many of the transactions involving Mr. Fani-Kayode were made in cash.
Meanwhile, the Chairman and editor-in-chief of Thisday newspaper, Nduka Obaigbena, has on Monday, January 4,  revealed that the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) collected N50 million from the Office of the National Security Adviser, in a further widening of the arms purchase scandal. Premium Times reports.
Special adviser to President Muhamamdu Buhari on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina was the President of Nigerian guild of editors at the time.
Mr. Obaigbena, who is also the president of Newspaper Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN) stated this in a letter to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, dated December 30, 2015.
The EFCC had last December invited the NPAN president in connection with the ongoing probe into the $2.1 billion arms procurement fund allegedly misappropriated by the former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki.
While NGE has called for the probe of the arms procurement scam, the NPAN president indicated that the editors also collected N50 million cash from Mr. Dasuki’s office.

“Even when he (Dasuki’s aide) suggested that The Nigerian Guild of Editors – NGE – who are now calling for a probe – was paid N50,000,000 cash by the ONSA when President Jonathan donated to the building of the NGE secretariat, I still refused to collect cash,” Mr. Obaigbena said.
“And in any case, I had no independent confirmation the Nigerian Guild of Editors had collected cash.”

Mr. Obaigbena argued that there was no way NPAN could have known which subhead the funds were paid from. He argued that the media practitioners could not know or speculate which line item the spending was made from by the ONSA.

“There is simply no nexus between payments made for compensation, to us victims of terrorism as well as to newspapers in compensation for an unprovoked attack on free speech, and any arms purchase budget,” he stated.