The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) in the last general elections in Zamfara state, Alhaji Sani Abdullahi Shinkafi, has called for an urgent investigation of the immediate-past Zamfara State Governor, Abdulaziz Yari, over alleged N21billion rural electrification scam.
In a statement on Wednesday, he said the 14 local government councils in the state were coerced into paying about N1.5billion as custom/import duties for the electrification project in 87 towns in the state and the contract was never executed.
According to him, the contract was originally awarded to Alliance Trading Company Limited belonging to a brother of a former Governor of Kebbi state at the cost of N5.8m but was later variated to N21.2billion.
“The rural electrification contract was to be financed by the State Government and the 14 local governments in the state and the monies was deducted from the local governments and the State Governor Alhaji Abdulaziz Yari approved the payments to the contractor on March 27th, 2017 and nothing is on ground to show for the huge sums of money allegedly expended on the project,” he said.
Shinkafi had on July 1st 2019 petitioned the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) asking for the investigation of the former Governor Yari over allegations of misappropriating, diversion and stealing of over N251bn belonging to Zamfara State whilst he held sway as the state governor.
“I had called on the commission (EFCC) to investigate, prosecute former Governor of Zamfara State Abdulaziz Yari over the misappropriation, diversion, siphoning and financial recklessness of N251bn as alleged by the Transition Committee Chairman headed by the immediate-past Deputy Governor of the Zamfara State, Malam Ibrahim Wakkala,” he said.
He said that the former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Prof. Abdullahi Shinkafi, had claimed on camera that the Zamfara State Government spent N35bn on the procurement of vehicles for security agencies in the state and the purchase of bedding and other relief materials for the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps in the state.
He said that it is on record that all the 14 local governments in Zamfara state which were attacked by armed bandits have no single IDP camp established by the State Government, not to talk of the purchase of relief materials for the camps.
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