Nigeria’s Senate President Bukola Saraki is in the news again for the wrong reasons and might be on a collision course with law enforcement agents.
A 35-year old kidnap suspect, Abdulrasheed Maigari, arrested by the police has revealed how he and others stole N310m from the residence of the Senate President in Abuja in 2015.
Saraki never reported that the said money was missing.
Maigari, in a report published by the Vanguard, said he and his gang suspected that the money found in Saraki’s house was government money wrongly appropriated by the Senate President and so decided to steal it.
The suspect who is now in police custody with members of his gang, confessed that he was part of the security men who stole N310million from Saraki’s house.
According to him, it was an Army captain in charge of the security of the place that ordered the robbery.
He disclosed that his share from the stolen N310m was N30m.
The report described Maigari as a graduate of political science from the Ado Bayero University, Kano who enlisted into the Department of State Service (DSS) as a Senior Intelligence Officer in 2011 and was later posted to the Maitama residence of Saraki in 2015.
“I served in operations department at Gombe and Osun Commands of the DSS before my dismissal in 2015. Before I was dismissed, I was posted to the home of the Senate President Bukola Saraki in Maitama and in November 2015, I can’t recall the exact date, three vehicles brought in the N310 million into the compound and the army captain who was on ground that day ordered that we should take the money away because he suspected the money was government money which could have been wrongly appropriated and could, therefore, be taken.
”We were four DSS operatives and four army officers involved and we drove the three cars to a house in Suleja where the money was shared.
“I got N30 million and I bought a car and took it to Kaduna state where I hid the rest of my share.”
Maigari revealed further that when he returned to Abuja, he was asked to report at DSS headquarters where he was interrogated over the theft and detained for five months, dismissed and charged to court.
He was remanded in Kuje Prison but later granted bail by the court on health grounds.
Maigari was among kidnappers who kidnapped Alhaji Isa Ozi Salami last month and were apprehended by the police after their leader collected N2.8 million and was still spoiling for more money when luck ran out on them.
