Appearing before the Senate Committee investigating the operations of the Treasury Single Account (TSA) yesterday, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele said that he knew nothing about the scheme before the probe.
The CBN Governor denied knowledge of the appointment of a private firm to manage the transfer of funds to the apex bank in compliance with the TSA regime that led to the alleged payment of N25 billion to System Spec. System Spec is the owner of Remita, the software that was used for the transfer.
Also, the Accountant General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, disclosed that he never signed any payment for System Spec which facilitated the transfer of funds from all Federal Government agencies to the CBN. Idris also told the committee that he never signed any document for the appointment of the firm.
The Senate had last month asked its committees on Finance, Banking and other Financial Institutions and Public Accounts to carry out a holistic investigation into the operation of the TSA and report back in 4 weeks. Speaking before the committee, the CBN Governor said, “I must openly and honestly own up to you that I did not know that one per cent was being deducted on the transfer of funds to TSA account until the Senate raised it.
“I immediately called Remita (System Spec) and insisted that they should reverse and return the money they collected. That is what I know.”
Emefiele also told the committee that he had never agreed with the one percent charge by the company on the amount transferred to CBN from government agencies pointing out that it was exorbitant.
He, however, accepted that an inter-departmental committee of the CBN approved the one percent charge which he insisted he was never aware of.
But the Managing Director of System Spec, John Obaro, presented documents showing that a former deputy governor of CBN, Tunde Lemon, signed the contract for the firm’s appointment beginning from October 2012 and ending in November 2013.
When the committee pointed out that there was no document showing the appointment was renewed in 2015 particularly for the TSA job, Obaro explained that the 2012 appointment letter made provision for a re-engagement which he argued was what was used in re-appointing the company in 2015 for the TSA job. The sharing ratio according to Obaro is 50 per cent for System Spec, 40 percent for commercial banks and 10 per cent for the CBN.
The accountant general informed the committee that he refused to sign the contract document for the appointment of System Spec because he was not party to the terms. “I was approached to sign a document on the appointment of System Spec but I refused to sign because I was not party to the terms. Part of the reason was that I disagreed with the payment of one per cent charge. There is no agreement between my office and the CBN on the appointment of Remita (System Spec). My office has never made any payment to anybody including Remita (System Spec)as far as this TSA transaction is concerned”, Idris said.
