The allegation of diversion of N1 trillion by the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ibrahim Lamorde, may lead to his removal, DAILY POST has learnt.

This is as those behind the petition have resolved to ensure they get the attention of President Muhammadu Buhari, through evidences, to prove that Lamorde is corrupt

“Forget the the public defence he is putting up, he is only meters away from being nailed.” an aide to a Senator from the North told our correspondent Monday night.

According to the Special Assistant who spoke on condition of anonymity, “Lamorde, who had failed to act on hundreds of high-profile petitions forwarded to his agency over the years and suddenly behaving like he knows his job, is not a clean man”

Our source said Senators loyal to the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, were ready to back their claims that he diverted N1 trillion recovered by the EFCC.

The Senators initiated moves to nail Lamorde shortly after the agency invited the Senate President’s wife, Toyin Saraki, over allegations that she committed fraud while her husband served as the governor of Kwara State.

Lamorde, it was gathered, drew the anger of the lawmakers, when they discovered that prominent chieftains of the All Progressives Congress, APC, opposed to the emergence of Saraki as the number 3 citizen, pressured the EFCC to probe Saraki’s wife.

“They know it would be difficult to probe Saraki directly, so they tasked Lamorde to beam the searchlight on his wife. That was dirty politics.

“But these dumb politicians do not know that the man they recruited to the job is far from being a saint.

“The Senate President’s friends in the red chamber simply told him to go to sleep, that they will fight back. That promise is what Nigerians are seeing and the evidence that will be put forward will shock everyone.

“They have more than enough evidences in their possession; some of it will be sent to media houses soon.”

DAILY POST recalls that the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions last week accused Lamorde of fraudulently diverting over N1 trillion proceeds of corruption recovered by the agency.

The money allegedly included funds recovered from former Governor of Bayelsa State, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha and ex-Inspector-General of Police, Tafa Balogun.

Punch had reported that the petitioner, George Uboh, whose complaint to the Senate prompted the probe, has been invited to appear before the Senate committee at Meeting Room 120 of the New Senate Building, National Assembly Complex, Abuja, by 10 am on Wednesday.

A similar invitation, it was learnt, had been extended to Lamorde to appear before the Senate committee the same time on Wednesday.

The fraud allegedly perpetrated by Larmode was said to have dated back to his days as the Director of Operations of the EFCC between 2003 and 2007, as well as an acting Chairman of the commission between June 2007 and May 2008, when the then chairman of the anti-graft agency, Nuhu Ribadu, was away for a course at the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies, Kuru, Jos.

Uboh, Chief Executive Officer of Panic Alert Security Systems, a security firm, in his petition dated July 31, 2015, accused Lamorde of specific instances of under-remittance and non-disclosure of proceeds of corruption recovered from criminal suspects, including Balogun and Alamieyeseigha.

He assured the Senate that he would produce “overwhelming evidence” to back his claims against Lamorde.

Uboh also alleged that the EFCC had not accounted for “offshore recoveries” and that “over half of the assets seized from suspects are not reflected in EFCC exhibit records”.

The petitioner equally accused Lamorde of conspiring with some EFCC officers and external auditors “to operate and conceal a recovery account in the Central Bank of Nigeria and excluded the balances from your audited financial statements between 2005 and 2011”.

“Lamorde continues to conceal the details of the unsold properties forfeited by both Tafa Balogun and DSP Alamieyeseigha despite receiving rent revenues from some estate agents on the said properties,” he further alleged.

Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the Senate Caucus, has said it is not backing its member, Senator Peter Nwaoboshi, who is demanding the petition against Lamorde be investigated.

Nwaoboshi, is an ally of the Senate President, Bukola Saraki.

The caucus, in a statement signed by the Senate Minority Leader, Sen. Godswill Akpabio, Sen. Phillip Aduda (FCT), Sen. Emmanuel Bwacha (Taraba) and Senator Abiodun Olujimi (Ekiti), said: “It has come to the notice of the PDP leadership in the Senate that the Senate Committee on Public Petitions would begin a public hearing on Wednesday, 26th of August 2015 and the Committee has invited the Chairman of EFCC to appear before it.

“The PDP leadership in the Senate is not against any committee of the Senate performing its oversight duties and or functions but we feel that this is not the appropriate time to embark on this most important assignment, particularly since this same action was mooted and has failed at previous plenary session.

“We therefore urge the committee to suspend its public hearing on this particular matter until further notice.

“The PDP Senate leadership reassures the Nigerian public of its support for the war against corruption by the Federal Government of Nigeria but hastens to add that such fight against corruption should be total and not selective.

“Nigerians need peace at this period of economic challenges precipitated by the falling oil prices and actions that will overheat the polity and generate unnecessary friction between the Executive and the Legislature should be guided.”

Reacting to their statement, our source said Akpabio and other were jittery because Lamorde may send detectives after them if he found out that they were supporting the petition against him.

However, Lamorde himself is no longer at ease.

DAILY POST gathered that he has started reaching out to Senators and other prominent Nigerians to help discredit the petition as well as speak glowingly about him.

Apparently acting on his directive, the EFCC yesterday reacted to the on-going controversy.

It described the allegations against Lamorde as “infantile and fabricated”.

A statement by the commission’s Head, Media and Publicity, Mr. Wilson Uwujaren, said: “The attention of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has been drawn to a report captioned, Alleged N1tn diversion: Senate to probe Lamorde’s alleged diversion of N1tn, which appeared in a newspaper of Monday August 24, 2015 containing salacious claims of corruption against the person of the chairman of the Commission, Ibrahim Lamorde.

“The EFCC should ordinarily not dignify the publication with a response as the motives of the promoters and their media allies are to impugn the integrity of the EFCC boss with fabricated stories of corruption.

“However the Commission is constrained to respond, to expose the motive behind the sinister plot.

“In the first instance, claims of a N1trillion corruption in the EFCC is infantile and assaults the sensibilities of all reasonable stakeholders in the anti- corruption fight.

“Even if the EFCC had not returned a kobo of recovered assets in its 12 years existence in addition to the yearly appropriated funds from the federation account, it will be nowhere near a trillion naira.

“This clearly exposes the mission of the so called petitioner as nothing more than mischief, designed to smear Lamorde.

“More sinister is the discovery that the so-called petition did not follow the procedure for consideration by the Senate. It was sent, not to the Senate but to a member, Senate Peter Nwaoboshi, a first term senator from Delta North.

“Under the Senate rules, petitions meant for consideration by the red chamber are sent to the Senate, not to a member of the Senate.

“Also, petitions meant for the Senate are tabled at the plenary, before they are referred to the relevant committees for further consideration. In this instance, the Senate has been on recess and there is no evidence that the so called petition was considered at plenary and referred to any committee.

“The EFCC as an agency that is founded on transparency is not afraid of any ‘probe’ or request for information regarding its activities by individuals, groups or organs of government; so far as such requests followed due process of law.

“The EFCC under Lamorde did not need the prompting of anyone, when it commissioned a reputable international audit firm, KPMG, to carry out comprehensive audit of exhibits and forfeited assets of the Commission from 2003 to date.

“The report of the audit will be made public once it is ready. Were the Commission to be jittery about its records, it would not have embarked on such audit.

“The EFCC however warns that those who peddle false information with the intent to mislead should be reminded that there is a subsisting law on false information and the consequence for violation is grave.