Tuesday, 26 January 2016

Principal suspect in N559.3m PENGASSAN housing scam jumps bail

 
A principal suspect in the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association, PENGASSAN, N559.5 million housing fraud (names withheld), has jumped bail and gone into hiding as operatives of the fraud unit, Panti, Lagos, intensify investigation into the scam.

Vanguard had earlier in the month, exclusively reported the scam that has put the umbrella body for senior staff in the nation’s petroleum industry in disarray.

Sources said his surety had been arrested by the operatives and was now helping to track down the suspect, a senior account staff of PENGASSAN.


According to Vanguard’s investigation, the account staff, who was suspended for six months by the union in November 2015, alongside a senior staff to pave way for unhindered investigation of the fraud, was granted bail in November after he had made a statement and promised to report back whenever he was needed.

It was gathered that he was initially communicated with the operatives through the phone, but when he was asked to report back for further questioning about two weeks ago, he did not and had since been on the ran.

Vanguard sources said the operatives have been deployed to different locations in Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, and other neighbouring states to apprehend the fleeing suspect.

It would be recalled that Vanguard had  on Thursday, January 7, broke news of the over N559,308,790 housing project scam rocking PENGASSAN.

The said amount is alleged to be unaccounted for after an internal investigation of PENGASSAN Housing Project between 2009 and 2015.

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