The House of Representatives has ordered the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to investigate an alleged illegal movement of N4 billion from the Industrial Trust Fund’s account domiciled in Keystone Bank.

Vice Chairman, Public Accounts Committee, House of Representatives, Ibrahim Baba made the call after a query issued by the office of the Auditor-General of the Federation.

The query noted that N4.2 billion was illegally moved three times in November from ITF account to other accounts.

The Office of the Auditor-General questioned why the money was being moved without remitting N23.5 million interest accruing from the transactions to the agency’s account.

Director-General and Executive Chairman, ITF, Joseph Ari, said the transactions were made without the authorisation of the agency while responding to the query.

Ari said the bank’s response in May 2012 explained that the withdrawal from ITF’s remittal control account was done in error.

According to Ari, Keystone’s position is that it was a wrong posting but was later corrected.

He said: “However within the days the money was moved, ITF wrote Keystone Bank to remit the interest to the account accordingly but the bank didn’t reply.

“We reported the matter to the Central Bank of Nigeria and the CBN advised that parties should sit down and discuss.

“However, we sat down with keystone officials without finding solution.”