FCC Chairman Muheeba Dankaka
By Our Reporter
The chairman of Federal Character Commission (FCC) Muheeba Dankaka has been accused of job racketeering by some FCC commissioners.
NATIONAL WAVES gathered that the commissioners accused the chairman why they appeared appeared before the House of Representatives Ad-hoc Committee, investigating job racketeering and gross mismanagement of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) in Nigeria, yesterday.
The commissioners tendered evidentiary records while making damning allegations against the chairman before the committee while their boss equally threw the garbage at them.
It would be recalled that the commuttee Dankaka 24 hours ultimatum to Dankaka to appear before it along with the 37 Commissioners of the FCC, having allegedly shunned the panel hearing as disclosed by the Commissioner for Delta State, Moses Anaughe.
At the resumed hearing of the committee, Anaughe speaking on the documents he tendered in collaboration with some of his colleagues alleged that the chairman has not been following the balancing index of jobs distribution.
He particularly alleged that when there is any request of recruitment, the chairman will request the chief executives of the ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) to come to her office where she demands for 10 percent which are sold by her.
“She does collect 10 percent from all MDAs of all the employment she is signing. All those 10 percent she is collecting, those are the slots that she employs agents that are selling.
“I have two employment letters here of her children in juicy agencies where the annual salary is N6.1 million, the other one is N8.2 million. I have the appointment letters here.
“And I just also want to inform this Committee, if she finds any agency doing employment that is paying more than these MDAs, she will move them to that MDA. She moves them from MDA to MDA.
“Then lastly, the letters of appointments she signed for 24 ghost workers. I call them ghost workers because they are receiving salary after paying for the job and getting appointment letters, they also refused to resume work. The account number of the transaction of those transactions, I have the account number.
“If this committee requests for the account statements of all these transactions of jobs selling of the agents of the chairman, it will receive all of them. She has a lot of agents selling slots for her.
“After selling they have a central pool where they remit all the monies to, whereby they will withdraw and collect USSD and give to her. I have all the account details here. In my submission, we have a lot of things to reveal,” the Delta Commissioner added.
Leadership reports that the commissioner representing Nasarawa State in FCC, Mamman Alakaye, aligned himself with the allegations against the chairman, accusing her of running the commission as a sole administrator.
“Mr chairman, I want to tender a document to support what my colleagues have said so far. For example, her son was employed in NCC which I am aware. Just last week she transferred him from NCC to Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission. He did his documentation with IPPIS just this week. I have the document to tender”, said Alakaye.
Other commissioners, including those representing Rivers, Kwara, Kaduna, Osun, Lagos agreed to the allegations by their colleagues and expressed disappointment with the chairman.
In her reply, Dankaka said the allegations were the expression of corruption fighting back as she swore by the Holy Quran that they were outright falsehood, adding that there has been job racketeering at the FCC before her coming.
“I now believe the adage that says when you fight corruption, corruption will fight back. I can take an oath with the Quran. Before I came here, I had made my name. I had made my money.
“All of them are always in my office. But what they wanted me to do, I told them I cannot do it. Before I got to this place, they were selling slots. The place was like a market place. You can find out from people that live in Abuja if I am lying.
“They were going round from one place to the other with some fake commissioners. I sent letters to all the MDAs that if they do not see my signatures they should not honour it. I am so surprised but I will come back to that.
“I have 37 commissioners. I wish all of us were here. Former governor, deputies, professors. If they are here they would testify to it. They are all by my side. I have 30 and they have seven. I stood my ground, period,” she stated.
The committee chairman, Yusuf Gagdi, in his intervention said FCC was not serious as it has no updated records.
“It confused the members of this committee, even the records you give us, regarding the time you took over from 2020 is not up to date. So, do you want us to believe Federal Character is serious? That a document that emanates from you to agencies you are now writing to agencies to give you those documents? Does that make sense?”
The committee therefore asked the chairman to collect the submission against her and reappear on Monday with the 37 commissioners and respond appropriately to the allegations.
