EFCC drills Stella Oduah for ten hours over N9.4b airport security contract

For over ten hours on Monday, officials of Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) questioned Stella Oduah, former Minister of Aviation, over what she knows about the award of, and implementation of N9.4 billion for the provision of security in 22 airports across Nigeria.

EFCC said the contract was not properly executed and therefore invited Oduah, now a sitting Senator representing Anambra State to its Headquarters in Abuja for explanation.

But the former Minister in denying the claim, insisted that she did nothing wrong while she held sway as Aviation Minister under former President Goodluck Jonathan and has not been able to honour the EFCC invitation to speak up on the matter until Monday morning when she presented herself to her interrogators.

She reportedly arrived the headquarters of the Commission at about 11 am after which the operatives of the anti-graft agency took her in for questioning.

“Oduah arrived the headquarters of the agency in Abuja at about 11am and was still being grilled by a team of investigators by 6pm.

“She was invited over a number of allegations bordering on abuse of office and money laundering. One of the allegations concerns fraud in the N9.4bn ISEC contract for security installations in some airports.

“She was invited on three different occasions to report for interview on the 13th June, 2017, 29th June 2017 and 13th November 2017 but she failed to honour any of the invitations.

“Rather than appear to face a panel that was raised by the EFCC to interrogate her, Oduah, through a letter dated January 5, 2018, informed the commission that she would honour the invite on January 29, 2018.

“The contract was awarded when she held sway as Minister of Aviation in the administration of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan. “There were issues surrounding the contract, including alleged non-execution of the project in some airports, abandonment of the contract in a few ones, diversion of part of the contract sum and suspected case of money laundering,” said an official of the Commission

It will be recalled that based on her inability to report, EFCC had earlier threatened to declare her wanted in connection with the failed security contract after she failed to report to the agency after being invited thrice in the last one year.