The former governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai’s efforts to secure an administrative bail to leave the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) custody may not come to fruition again after the anti-graft agency handed him over to the Department of State Services (DSS) for questioning over wire-tapping allegations.
As gathered, the DSS received the former governor from the EFCC, barely five days after seizing his passport at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja on arrival from his annual leave abroad, after publicly admitting to having conspired with others to allegedly wiretap the National Security Adviser (NSA) to the president, Nuhu Ribadu’s conversation.
The Guild learnt that the former minister was received on Wednesday by DSS at its headquarters in Abuja after spending two nights inside EFCC custody, where he had suddenly become sober and started complying with the anti-corruption agency’s requests.
Sources said that the move was to allegedly persuade the anti-graft agency to shift ground, granting him administrative bail on the allegation of mismanaging N423 billion during his eight-year stay in office as governor.
Meanwhile, the plan to persuade the EFCC has allegedly failed after the DSS approached the anti-corruption agency with valid court injunctions permitting it to investigate the former governor for allegedly wiretapping the NSA to the president.
A staff member of the DSS, who witnessed the handover session, described the process as a football transfer, saying the wire-tapping investigation does not invalidate the N423 billion allegedly mismanaged by the former minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) while serving as the Kaduna State governor.
He noted that after the DSS quizzes the former governor to conclude their investigation, El-Rufai would be sent back to the EFCC to complete his session with the anti-corruption agency.
According to him, we approached the EFCC to transfer him to us, and they accepted after we presented valid documents to back our requests. And the EFCC granted our request to pick him up.
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