Tuesday, January 28, 2025 - A witness of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has tendered evidence before a Federal Capital Territory, FCT, High Court in Abuja against a former Aviation Minister, Hadi Sirika.
The witness said Sirika awarded contracts to a company linked to Jalal
Sule Hamma, his son-in-law.
The anti-graft agency is prosecuting Sirika alongside his daughter,
Fatima, and son-in-law, Hamma, on a six-count amended charge bordering on
contract fraud to the tune of N2,825,032,220.97.
According to the prosecution, Sirika used his position to confer an
undue advantage upon Al Buraq Global Investment Limited, whose alter ego,
Fatima Hadi Sirika and Jalal Sule Hamma, are his daughter and son-in-law,
respectively, by using his position to influence the award to them, the
contract for the Apron Extension at Katsina Airport for the sum of
N1,498,300,750.
While tendering the evidence under cross-examination at the court
session on Monday, a retired director in the procurement department of the
ministry of aviation, Musa Odiniyan, said the company could not have qualified
for the bidding process or the contract award if open and competitive bidding
had been done.
“We use some criteria for determining the award of contracts for
companies. I still maintain that if it was an open competitive bidding, the
company, Al Buraq, may not have qualified,” he stated.
The witness also informed the court that Sirika’s son-in-law’s firm was
paid a 100 percent fee for the project with the belief that it would be
commissioned before the immediate past President Muhammadu Buhari, finished his
term in 2023.
“The time of issuing the contract letter to the company (Al Buraq) was
at the twilight of the Buhari administration. That was why the contract has a
period of six months.
“The reason for the prompt payment (for the contract) was for it to be
completed and inaugurated before the exit of the Buhari administration and not
for the purpose of variation,” he said.
The judge, thereafter, adjourned the matter till March 10, 2025, for
continuation of the cross-examination.
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