Acting EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Magu has just completed his screening before the Senate and after a brief deliberation and majority vote, the Eighth Assembly has again rejected his nomination as Chairman of the anti-graft agency.

What we find questionable in all of these is the abrupt appearance of a fresh DSS report cited by Kogi West’s Senator Dino Melaye. He rose to announce the receipt of a fresh report from the DSS on Tuesday and referred to paragraph 14 which seemed to be the conclusion of the Department of State Services after vetting the nominee, Ibrahim Magu.

The paragraph read: “In the light of the foregoing, Magu has failed the integrity test and will eventually constitute a liability to the anti-corruption drive of the present administration.”

Senator Melaye went on to say that the Senate’s request to the DSS for nominee screening was not new and would not end with Magu. He added that to qualify for the position, Magu needed to appear pure and stainless before the House.

Magu responding to the DSS report immediately questioned the integrity of the agency for submitting two reports on the same day. It appeared that Magu was in a possession of a report that cleared him. He said, “DSS never gave me fair hearing in the allegations against me and it is a fundamental constitutional issue.

After a series of back and forth, the Senate resolved to reject Magu’s nomination. This was after the House clerk had confirmed that contrary to Magu’s claims, the House had received only one letter.

Former Majority Leader, Senator Ali Ndume now has risen in defence of Magu claiming that two letters were actually received. Now, all of these conflicting information is why we should collectively question the Senate’s intentions on this Magu matter from the onset.

Now, the photo below is the so-called fresh report received by the Senate:

This letter is a one-pager that only refers to the old report that was received by the House in October 2016. It is NOT a fresh report as Senator Dino said.

Here are screenshots of the previous report that was referred to and that we assume Senator Dino Melaye read from. It’s dated 3rd October 2016.

Until the Senate clarifies the situation of the existence of two security reports that indicts Ibrahim Magu, we have reason to believe that the rejection was premeditated and the upper chamber may have a hidden agenda.

Tolu

Your pop culture/entertainment go-to. Music head. Wallflower. I do not like to write. On a mission to decipher covfefe.