PFIPC has no CBN account, received no funds, salaries – OAGF

The Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF) has again distanced the federal government from the embattled Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), insisting the outfit has no functional account with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and didn’t receive any sum from the taxpayers’ money.

 The clarification came from the OAGF’s Director of Public Relations, Bawa Mokwa, as the row over PFIPC’s legitimacy as a government body continues to deepen.

 The controversy came to the open on June 11, when the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, issued a disclaimer describing the PFIPC and its sister outfit, the Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC), as fictitious.

He said his office never appointed anyone to head either body and named the self-styled convener of both councils, Adeniyi Adeyemi, as an impostor who is currently facing criminal prosecution.

Also presidential spokesman, Bayo Onanuga, on July 1, in a post on his X handle, said  Adeyemi had used forged papers to trick the OAGF into helping him open a CBN account.

Citing police findings, Onanuga said Adeyemi built the deception on documents he fabricated himself, but stressed that investigators had confirmed no government money ever moved into the account. But Adeyemi pushed back.

OAGF responds

Making further clarifications, Mokwa pointed out that no public funds or salaries had ever been paid to PFIPC, and that the process of setting up a CBN account for the council was, in fact, never completed because the paperwork needed to activate it was never submitted.

 He explained that opening an account with the apex bank is not something any agency can do unilaterally.

“You cannot open an account at the CBN without authorisation from the Accountant-General. The Accountant-General will authorise them to open an account at the CBN,” Mokwa said, underscoring that the OAGF sits squarely in the approval chain for any such transaction.

Mokwa maintained that the accounts were never operational. According to him, Adeyemi had approached the OAGF bearing an appointment letter.

But the letter, Mokwa alleged, actually referred to a different, already-existing agency rather than to PFIPC itself. The account-opening process was triggered by that document, he said,  adding however that it got stalled because the names of officials meant to serve as signatories to the account were never supplied.

Without signatories, Mokwa argued, there was simply no way  his office could release any government funds, since there was no operational channel neither an internal account nor a functioning CBN one through which payment could pass.

 “The account, till today, has not seen the light of day. It has not seen one kobo because the account is not completely operational,” Mokwa said, adding that this proves Adeyemi has not collected any money from government coffers.

 “The AGF has not released a dime to him because they don’t even have a place where the money can be paid,” he said.

No staff, no salaries, no budget

Mokwa said the council had yet to receive any budgetary allocation, noting that funding for PFIPC was only billed for the 2026 budget cycle and had not reached a stage where funds could actually be disbursed.

He also rejected claims that workers at the agency had been paid salaries, saying PFIPC has not recruited any staff through the channels required of federal establishments.

“Based on our knowledge, he has not employed anybody,” Mokwa said.

Walking through the standard recruitment process, Mokwa explained that before any federal agency can hire and place workers on the government payroll, it must first secure clearances from three bodies: the Federal Character Commission, the Budget Office, and the Federal Civil Service Commission. Only after securing those approvals can an agency forward employee names to the OAGF for enrolment on the federal payroll and eventual salary payment.

“If they give you a waiver for 200 people, you take the waiver to these agencies and then present the papers to the Accountant-General,” he said, adding that no name can be captured into the payroll system without clearing those hurdles first because once a name is captured, payment automatically follows from the budget office.

Mokwa said none of these preconditions had been met by PFIPC, reinforcing his office’s position that the council remains, for all practical purposes, without funding, staff, or an active bank account.

“You cannot open an account at the CBN without authorization from the Accountant General. The accountant general will authorise them to open an account at the CBN,” Mokwa said.

He said there was no channel through which the office of the accountant-general could release government funds to the agency due to the absence of an operational account.

“The account, till today, has not seen the light of day. It has not seen one kobo because the account is not completely operational,” Mokwa said.

“That portrays that he has not collected a dime. The AGF has not released a dime to him because they don’t even have a place where the money can be paid.”