President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has ordered a comprehensive forensic investigation into the circumstances surrounding the creation and operation of the fictitious Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), following findings by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).
The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, disclosed this on Wednesday while briefing State House correspondents after the Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Tinubu at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
According to Oyedele, the investigation will go beyond the fictitious council to examine the administrative procedures, accounting systems and internal controls that allowed an organisation without a legitimate government mandate to operate within the Federal Government structure.
He said the ICPC’s findings had also revealed the existence of additional fictitious agencies, prompting the President to order a wider review of government processes to determine how such entities were able to penetrate the system.
Oyedele said the Attorney-General of the Federation and his office had been directed to work with relevant government institutions to conduct a comprehensive assessment of the matter, covering its administrative, financial and governance implications.
The Finance Minister also disclosed that the review would extend to the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS), expressing concern that the existence of fake government agencies could potentially be linked to fictitious personnel on the federal payroll.
He stressed that the government could not afford leakages in the payroll system at a time when the administration was making efforts to improve the welfare of genuine public servants and strengthen the payment of salaries and allowances.
Oyedele further disclosed that about N9.495 trillion in subsidy savings and additional revenue had been deployed towards increased salaries and allowances for civil servants. He noted that the amount was even higher than the actual savings realised by the Federal Government from the removal of fuel subsidy.
He said the discovery of the fictitious council represented a serious systemic failure because those behind it had succeeded in obtaining an administrative code and a Treasury Single Account (TSA) code.
Although no government funds were ultimately paid into the accounts associated with the fictitious organisation, Oyedele said the fact that the process had advanced that far warranted a thorough investigation to identify those responsible and close the loopholes that made it possible.
The Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, also shed more light on the ICPC findings, revealing that the investigation had uncovered at least two other fictitious agencies in addition to the purported Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council.
Idris said President Tinubu was concerned not only about the financial implications of the scandal but also about the administrative weaknesses that allowed an organisation without a legal foundation to gain access to official government processes.
He said the President had therefore instructed the Attorney-General of the Federation and the Finance Minister to jointly investigate the administrative and accounting lapses, while engaging professional audit firms to conduct a full forensic examination.
According to Idris, the objective is to identify the weaknesses in the system, correct them and prevent a recurrence of what he described as a national embarrassment.
The Information Minister further cautioned against attributing the development entirely to the present administration, noting that the circumstances surrounding the fictitious agencies could have originated before President Tinubu assumed office.
He added that the President had directed officials to investigate whether similar incidents had occurred in other parts of the Federal Government and develop safeguards capable of preventing such breaches in the future.
The controversy surrounding the PFIPC came to public attention after Adeniyi Adeyemi reportedly presented himself as the Director-General of the purported agency, which operated from an office within the Federal Secretariat in Abuja.
The matter subsequently attracted the attention of the House of Representatives ad hoc committee headed by Yusuf Gagdi, which began investigating how an organisation without an established legal foundation was able to function as a government agency and gain access to official administrative procedures.
The investigation was further heightened by claims that the purported agency had received an allocation of about N1.3 billion in the 2026 Appropriation Act.
Consequently, the House constituted the ad hoc committee to determine how the fictitious agency was established, how it was incorporated into the national budget and whether any government officials or institutions facilitated its activities.
The latest presidential directive is expected to widen the investigation beyond the PFIPC and examine the broader government systems that allowed fictitious entities to penetrate official structures.
