PFIPC Scandal: Presidency Blames Internal Collaborators as Adeyemi-Gbajabiamila Row Deepens
The row over the alleged Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC) deepened on Saturday after the Presidency accused internal collaborators in government agencies of helping Prince Adeniyi Adeyemi run the phantom outfit. The Kwankwasiyya Movement has demanded a full public explanation over reported budget allocations to the council.
The dispute centres on Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, and Adeyemi, who the Presidency says posed as Director-General of a council that never officially existed. The government maintains PFIPC was fictitious, but critics insist budget documents referencing the body demand independent scrutiny.
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Temitope Ajayi, called on the DSS, Police and EFCC to track down and prosecute officials who aided Adeyemi’s scheme.
Ajayi said it was clear that people inside government institutions helped Adeyemi forge presidential appointment letters, run 34 bank accounts under fake agency names, host foreign envoys, and even open a CBN account while posing as PFIPC head.
“What is not in doubt is that internal collaborators enabled Adeniyi to get this far. That is precisely what investigators from the DSS, the Police and the EFCC must now unravel. The criminal network within the affected institutions must be dismantled, and everyone found to have played a role should be arrested and prosecuted,” he said.
He branded Adeyemi “an irredeemable con artist” who exploited public distrust of corruption narratives to drag Gbajabiamila into the scandal and dodge liability. He added that critics who blame institutional failure ignore the fact that the same institutions eventually caught the fraud — officials at the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs flagged the anomalies that triggered the probe.
The Presidency recalled that Gbajabiamila had publicly disclaimed PFIPC on June 11, 2026, notifying foreign missions, banks and international bodies that it had no official status.
Adeyemi has since been arraigned before the Federal High Court, Abuja, on eight counts of fraud and forgery, and is due back in court on July 27 alongside two accomplices still at large.
Meanwhile, the Kwankwasiyya Movement said the matter has grown beyond one individual into a question of public accountability. In a statement by spokesperson Dr Habibu Sale Mohammed, the group asked how a non-existent council made it into the 2026 budget with a reported ₦1 billion allocation — and who approved it.
“If the council never existed, how did it find its way into the national budget? Who proposed and approved the allocation? Which government offices processed the documentation? Was any public money released or committed? If official documents were allegedly forged, how did they remain in use for such a long period without detection?” the group asked.
The movement warned that conflicting government accounts could damage public trust and Nigeria’s international standing, and urged the National Assembly and anti-corruption agencies to launch an independent probe.
Human rights lawyer Femi Falana has also criticised the Presidency’s stance, arguing it has no constitutional power to clear anyone in the matter, and calling on the ICPC to investigate both Gbajabiamila and Adeyemi independently.
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