What began as the Presidency’s effort to write off the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC) as a fictitious organisation has snowballed into a much wider controversy over the integrity of Nigeria’s public institutions.
It has also raised a number of questions on how an agency declared non-existent could supposedly operate within government circles and feature in the 2026 Appropriation Act with a N1.3 billion allocation.
Opposition leaders, lawyers, civil society groups and former senior government officials yesterday stepped up calls for an independent investigation warning that the affair has become a test of the Tinubu administration’s commitment to transparency and accountability.
The Presidency has dismissed Adeniyi Adeyemi as an impostor and cleared Chief of Staff Femi Gbajabiamila of bribery allegations but the central question has changed.
The question now is not just whether Adeyemi forged documents but whether Nigeria’s governance systems have enough weaknesses to let a fictitious institution pass through multiple layers of official scrutiny.
The chronology of the Presidency’s narrative indicates that the first signs of trouble emerged in October 2025 when the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) complained that the activities of PFIPC were incompatible with its statutory mandate.
Gbajabiamila had immediately petitioned the police and Department of State Services (DSS), calling the outfit fraudulent, the Presidency said. Adeyemi was later arrested and investigators reportedly recovered fake documents. The police thought both the council and his appointment were fake.
Normally such an explanation would have cleared the air. Instead, new questions were raised because the same council later featured in the 2026 Appropriation Act with an allocation of over N1.3 billion for personnel, overheads and capital expenditure. This shifted the controversy from a supposed criminal case to a governance conundrum.
What matters most is not the allegation of bribery. It is, rather, the budgetary trail.
There is no one person producing Nigeria’s budget. Proposals are usually initiated by the relevant institution before any agency can get an allocation, examined by the Budget Office, approved by the Executive in the Federal Executive Council and finally signed into law by the President after a thorough scrutiny by committees in both chambers of the National Assembly.
The implications are that if the Presidency insists that PFIPC never legally existed, then one of Nigeria’s most fundamental public finance processes seems to have failed, as stakeholders pointed to implications far beyond this particular controversy.
The issue of institutional validation is also ignored, for Adeyemi was not just making press statements. Public records show meetings with the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, meetings with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), consultations with the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), and plans for a World Investment Summit.
He stated that the council also maintained office space in the Federal Secretariat, operated bank accounts through the CBN and got recognition from the Office of the Head of the Civil Service.
How scandal shows up flaws in National Assembly oversight
One institution that could be responsible for a lot, perhaps most, of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC) scandal is the current bicameral National Assembly led by Senate President Godswill Akpabio.
From the outset, and perhaps due to his emergence as the first among equals in the federal parliament, Akpabio left no one in doubt that under his watch, the line of oversight between the Executive and the Legislature could become almost insignificant.
When the President first appeared to present the 2024 Appropriation Bill, lawmakers replaced the national anthem with the campaign song of President Tinubu, “On Your Mandate, We Shall Stand.” The Akpabio-led National Assembly appeared to have positioned itself to be in close tandem with the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration.
The 10th National Assembly, by choosing to stand on the President’s mandate, appeared to have effectively abdicated its constitutional role as a check on the Executive. The Legislature has a dual role in addition to the making of law, it must also ensure that the Executive acts in accordance with the rule of law and that the behaviour of the Executive is transparent and accountable.
At a press conference on June 25, 2026, Prince Adeyemi alleged that Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, received N400 million through an intermediary and subsequently demanded another N200 million to facilitate his appointment as Director of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council.
Adeyemi also said he rejected a request by the Chief of Staff for 48 per cent of the PFIPC’s proposed N27.4 billion take-off grant.
Reacting to the Chief of Staff’s denial of the existence of the council, Adeyemi said he was dismayed that Gbajabiamila could make a “disclaimer distancing the Office of the Chief of Staff to the President from the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), alongside the Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC).
He said: “My name’s been swept into this storm. I totally reject any attempt to reduce this to mere denials without answering the fundamental questions that Nigerians are now posing.
“The problem is no more personalities. It has to do with contradictions that call for responses.
It is derisory to hear the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila claim that he does not know about the existence of the agency as in the real world he should cover his face in shame.
“If Femi Gbajabiamila, who is supposed to be the Chief of Staff to the President and also the administrative gateway to the Presidency can make such an administrative error by allowing the President to sign a document containing a fake agency, he should possibly resign his appointment now.
The National Assembly also drew criticism after the chief executive of the disputed council asked: “How did the name of the agency get into the 2026 Appropriation Bill on pages 50 and 51? If the agency does not exist but has crept into the Nigerian national budget, it means the entire 2026 appropriation budget is fraudulent and should be jettisoned.
“What the Chief of Staff to the President is now saying by his denial, which has been published in various national dailies, is that our 109 distinguished senators among whom are seasoned administrators, former governors and diverse professional experts were incompetent to detect the fake agency in the national budget.
What it means is that our 360 House members are just rubber stamps, as has been rumored. This is not a question of emotions. It is procedural because the national budget is not presented in isolation. It winds its way through many layers of technical drafting, executive coordination, ministerial inputs, Budget Office scrutiny and finally, legislative scrutiny by both chambers of the National Assembly…”
Ex-SGF asks how fake agency operated without knowledge of the executive
FORMER Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), David Babachir Lawal has challenged the claims that a government agency could be running in the federal bureaucracy without the knowledge of the executive.
“It is abnormal for any organisation to be a government agency without passing through the laid down administrative processes,” Lawal said.
“If you’re asking me whether an agency of government can function without executive input, I don’t know how it can be done, because all those agencies report to the Office of the Secretary to the Government. The Secretary to Government signs letters of appointment. The Office of the Secretary to the Government provides offices for MDAs.
“So, I don’t know this government and their own style is different. But when I was there all appointment letters were signed by the SGF after the approval of the President. The President approves and directs you to sign the letters. “They come to the agencies, they come to you, they ask for office allocation and you allocate the office and so on and so forth.”
On whether the National Assembly could approve budgetary provisions without knowing whether such agencies existed, ex-Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir David Lawal, explained that budgets are first compiled by ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) and presented by the Budget Office at the Federal Executive Council (FEC) and later defended by the MDAs.
“Usually, the budgets are all lumped under the supervising minister and then he comes to defend them. In many cases, all MDAs defend their budgets before the Minister of Budget and Planning before it even gets there.
So, there are processes. I do not know how it can be done without the SGF knowing or the Federal Executive Council knowing. The budget is, after every MDA has defended the budget before the Budget Office, forwarded by the President to the National Assembly after approval by the Federal Executive Council.
“When you look at a line in the budget and you don’t see an owner, you start to question. But this is a different government. Their whole style is different. “I don’t know how they do it.
Lawal said the President has the power to award contracts without the input of the National Assembly, but such contracts must be backed by appropriated funds.
This government, their way of doing things is different. The President is the Executive President. I don’t know what he can do. “The National Assembly does not interfere with the awarding of contracts. What happens is, if the President awards a contract that has no money appropriated for it, that is an impeachable offense in the government I served in. But I don’t know now,” he said.
Atiku wants independent probe, says Presidency’s defence self-indicting
PRESIDENTIAL candidate of the African Democratic Congress, Atiku Abubakar, has described the presidency’s response to allegations against the chief of staff to the president, Femi Gbajabiamila, over the scandalous activities of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council and its director general, Adeniyi Adeyemi as self-indicting.
Atiku disclosed this in a statement issued by his spokesman, Phrank Shaibu, yesterday.
“The desperate attempt by the presidency to explain away the scandal surrounding the so-called PFIPC has inadvertently exposed a far more disturbing reality under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration,” Atiku said.
He said the response of presidential spokesperson, Bayo Onanuga, was not a defence of the government but a public confession of institutional collapse.
The allegations were too grave to be ignored, he said, and called for an urgent investigation into all parties involved, including the Central Bank of Nigeria and the National Assembly.
“There is an African proverb that says that ‘the man who points at the moon should not have blood on his finger.’ A government cannot claim to be exposing fraud while struggling to explain how that same fraud found its way to the very heart of the Nigerian state.
What the presidency meant as damage control has become self-indictment. Rather than quenching the fire, it has demonstrated how much the flames have gnawed at the foundations of governance.
“The Presidency would now have Nigerians to accept that one private citizen, on his own, forged presidential documents, impersonated senior government officials, set up an office inside the Federal Secretariat, allegedly opened dozens of bank accounts, including accounts with government identities, hosted foreign ambassadors without diplomatic clearance, got official recognition in several government circles, and almost embedded a phantom agency into the machinery of government, all without the help of any insider. That explanation requires much more faith than the scandal itself.
“There’s another African proverb that’s just as timeless: ‘When termites eat a tree from the inside, it looks perfect until the first storm comes.’ The false agency scandal is that storm. What Nigerians have witnessed is not just the unmasking of an alleged impostor, but the unmasking of institutions that have been hollowed out over years of negligence, incompetence and impunity.
What is more troubling is the glaring contradiction that the presidency has failed to explain.
“On the one hand it claims that PFIPC never existed and was nothing but a complex scam. On the flip side, public records reportedly indicate that the same council was allocated about N1.3 billion in the 2026 Appropriation Act, together with the Presidential Economic Advisory Council.
“This contradiction is too big to be ignored.
“If the agency was fictional, who wrote the budget estimates with its name on it? Which department submitted them? Who were the officials who defended these estimates before the National Assembly? What committees reviewed them? Who voted for them? Who put the “appropriate” in the appropriation bill? And who signed that budget into law?”
He said: “So we are calling for a genuinely independent investigation which follows the evidence where it may lead. There are no sacred cows here. No political immunity. No justice for some.”
Afenifere: FG can’t investigate itself, demands independent probe
THE Yoruba socio-cultural organisation, Afenifere, loyalist of the late Chief Ayo Adebanjo, yesterday, said it had little confidence in the Federal Government’s readiness to probe allegations against the President’s Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila, insisting that the administration “cannot investigate itself.”
Anti-corruption campaigners and civic organisations joined the group in calling for an independent, transparent and evidence-based investigation into the allegations, warning that any attempt to ignore or suppress the issue could damage public confidence in the government’s anti-corruption credentials.
Prince Justice Faloye, Afenifere’s National Publicity Secretary, told The Guardian in his personal capacity on the matter that the allegations against Gbajabiamila were not unexpected, alleging that they followed a pattern of misconduct.
Faloye alleged the Chief of Staff had become “the face of corruption” in President Bola Tinubu’s administration and insisted that Nigerians should not expect the Federal Government to conduct a credible investigation.
“I don’t think the Chief of Staff would have the audacity to do such things without the backing of powerful interests inside the system,” he charged.
He said a serious investigation is unlikely to be done inside the government unless there is pressure from civil society organisations, the media and other accountability institutions on the government.
He said the only way it could be done was through relentless public scrutiny and advocacy to compel the authorities to institute a credible and transparent probe into the allegations.
Debo Adeniran, Chairman of the Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) also reacted, urging the government to investigate the allegations in the interest of transparency, accountability and the rule of law.
Shielding the Chief of Staff from investigation could be counterproductive, he cautioned, while advising against treating allegations as proof of guilt.
While he said the allegations deserve serious attention, Adeniran said that due process must be allowed to run its course.
“There have been a few allegations around the development. But allegations alone are not sufficient. If a person thinks someone was involved, then they need to provide credible evidence.
“The responsibility of law enforcement agencies is to carry out an investigation with due diligence, impartiality and transparency. The bottom line question is: what evidence is there? Are there documents or physical evidence or credible witnesses who can substantiate the allegations?“he asked.
He stressed that every accused person is innocent until proven guilty, no matter what office he holds.
“If there are ongoing investigations, the authorities should gather all the evidence available, including eyewitness testimony where necessary, and let the facts speak for themselves.”
“Where there is enough evidence, the law should be allowed to take its course. Where there is no such thing, no one should be tried by public opinion.
Some have claimed the government is trying to suppress or influence the process. Such claims must be looked into too. “The investigation should remain open, transparent and evidence-based so that the truth can come out and justice can be done,” he added.
Similarly, the Yoruba Ronu Leadership Forum urged President Tinubu’s administration not to sweep the allegations under the carpet, while calling for a holistic review of alleged irregularities in the budgeting process.
The forum’s President, Akin Malaolu, stated in a statement that the allegations of bribery for appointments and demands for kickbacks raise serious questions that should be independently investigated.
While the forum recognized that Gbajabiamila had denied the allegations and described them as false and politically motivated, it emphasized that the matter should not be settled with mere denials.
It called on the Federal Government to investigate the allegations in the national interest and prosecute those found culpable after due process.
The forum also urged the President to ensure that allegations of budget padding and fraudulent insertions into federal budgets were thoroughly investigated, warning that any manipulation of the nation’s budget constitutes a betrayal of public trust and should not be tolerated.
Lawyers Demand Probe, Cite Scandal as Institutional Failure
Reacting, the Convener, Security Situation Room, Mr Douglas Ogbankwa said: “The whole thing is a shame to the country.
“It is unheard of that an agency operating from the Federal Secretariat is fake, he said.
‘I have been to the Federal Secretariat once or twice in my life.
They won’t let you into the structure if you don’t know who you are.
“So, apart from identifying yourself, you have to tell them exactly where you are going and who you want to see before they can give you access to the Federal Secretariat. It is in the Three Arms Zone, which is like the green zone of the Federal Government.
“Now imagine someone taking space in the Federal Secretariat, putting the portrait of the President, his own portrait, the coat of arms and the national flag,” he queried.
Ogbankwa said that it is not easy for ambassadors to be hosted without a recommendation from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, saying that Prince Adeniyi Adeyemi had the contacts to be involved in those indicated.
He also wondered how the agency got into the national budget and also got Gazetted by the federal government.
“So they need to stop the bullshit. For me, Gbajabiamila should go.
“There are certain things, when you start talking to some of us, you make us feel like we’re fools. We are not stupid. He said the fact is that he has been caught red-handed and urged the actors to stop weaving wrong narratives to divert attention.
He said taking Adeyemi to court is not a problem, but the people involved in the scandal should be identified, investigated and also sanctioned.
He said they were making frantic efforts to bury the incident under the carpet, warning that a judicial panel of enquiry should be inaugurated to unravel the truth about the incident.
He said: “If an agency can set up 34 bank accounts, set up nine accounts with the Central Bank of Nigeria and can have the Central Bank of Nigeria credited with over N1 billion, it should not be a fake agency.
“They have to get out of the way. Bummer. No country in the world will take us seriously with this kind of thing going on.
“This is a state, not a children’s play. “Even if you don’t know what you do, the role of a state is not a joke.
If this is true then there are other fake agencies in the government not known to the public and those involved should hide their faces in shame, the lawyer said.
A Kano-based lawyer, Abubakar Sani, said the scandal was an inside job.
He said it was a “conspiracy” involving all the relevant agencies (at all levels).
They were compromised. You scratch my back… All in breach of their oaths of office under the Constitution (7th Schedule).
Otherwise it would have been completely impossible to execute with such brazenness and impunity,” he said.
The senior lawyer said that law enforcement and regulatory agencies such as the ICPC, EFCC and the Code of Conduct Bureau had questions to answer for sleeping on their beat.
He asked: “Will they dare to step on the very big toes obviously involved? Will they give names? Who are the guilty parties in the system? Who would dare blow the whistle on them?
“There are more questions than answers in the scandal, clearly. Nigerians are watching and waiting. “Perhaps another public interest suit by SERAP (or maybe an application under FOI) will be the trigger before a semblance of action is taken.”
Also lamenting the unprecedented level of corruption within the ranks in various government agencies, a Lagos based lawyer, Mr Stephen Azubuike, said it makes ugly stories like this believable.
“During a thorough check of this fraudulent scheme, the role of accomplices within the system will certainly be revealed, who carefully ensured the success of the well-orchestrated criminal venture,” he said.
“With all we have seen in this country, from loads of cash taking lease of apartments to wild animals swallowing funds, the story of Adeyemi Adeniyi is one of those stories, we only wish were fairy tales. He said:
Ex-minister: Defence from Presidency raises more questions than it answers
Former Minister of Youth and Sports, Solomon Dalung, has slammed the Presidency’s defence of the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, over the alleged activities of Prince Adeniyi Adeyemi, saying the official response left many critical questions unanswered.
Dalung was reacting to a statement by Presidential spokesman Bayo Onanuga, who sought to clear Gbajabiamila of any involvement in the matter.
Dalung said despite the Presidency’s attempt to exonerate the Chief of Staff, the explanation pointed to what he called huge gaps in government oversight.
He said that irrespective of the outcome of the ongoing court case involving Adeyemi, the Presidency still has an explanation to give to Nigerians on how a purported fictitious presidential agency operated within the government without being detected.
Dalung wondered how a person could allegedly set up a fake government agency, forge an appointment letter, operate from the Federal Secretariat, recruit personnel, liaise with government institutions, meet with diplomats and reportedly obtain a Central Bank of Nigeria account without official attention.
He also expressed his concern about reports that the alleged agency was included in the national budget, noting that budget proposals undergo multiple levels of scrutiny by the executive and legislative branches before they are approved.
“If the council was fake, tell us how it was in the budget,” Dalung asked.
He said the Presidency did not explain who introduced the budget provision, who processed it and who approved it during the budget process.
He further asked how the office space was allegedly obtained at the Federal Secretariat and which authority approved the allocation and why the operation was not discovered earlier.
He also mentioned the Presidency’s naming of Dolapo Babatunde Tanimola, who investigators are said to have identified as the man Prince Adeyemi Adeyemi said assisted him in procuring the purportedly forged appointment letter before he was said to have died in a hotel fire days before his arrest.
Dalung queried whether the investigators had fully looked into the circumstances surrounding the death of Tanimola, including whether there had been an autopsy, coroner’s inquest or whether there had been a forensic analysis of his communications and financial records.
Dalung however said that while the allegations against Adeyemi were now before the court, accountability should not be limited to prosecuting one person.
He said the government must also explain how its institutions allegedly interacted with, or failed to detect, what the Presidency now calls a fictitious agency.
Dalung called on the Presidency to make public documentary evidence, timelines and official records regarding the alleged inclusion of the agency in the national budget, its claimed operations within the Federal Secretariat and the apparent failure of institutional safeguards.
CISLAC calls for transparency in PFIPC saga investigation
THE Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) has called for an independent investigation into the alleged activities of Adeniyi Adeyemi, saying the controversy exposes serious institutional failures that threaten public confidence in government.
The statement, which was signed by the Executive Director, Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, said the organisation was concerned that Adeyemi operated for years under the guise of leading the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council and the Presidential Economic Advisory Council. The statement alleged that Adeyemi maintained government offices, operated bank accounts, employed staff and interacted with several public institutions before being declared an impostor.
The CISLAC stated that should the allegations be verified, the scandal extends beyond an individual and indicates a wide breakdown in administrative controls, due diligence and institutional oversight. It urged the Presidency to support an open and independent probe into the actions or inaction of all agencies and officials who allegedly facilitated the operation.
The organisation also asked for a forensic audit of all accounts and transactions pertaining to the alleged councils, as well as a review of procedures governing presidential committees and advisory bodies, and sanctions against any public officials found to have facilitated or failed to prevent the alleged misconduct. The probe should be used to improve governance systems and avoid such incidents in future, it said.
Analyst raises concern over PFIPC’s N1.3b budget allocation
A PUBLIC affairs commentator, Walter Ononuju Nnadi, has questioned an apparent contradiction between the position of the Presidency and the 2026 Appropriation Act on the existence of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council.
“The issue raises concerns about transparency, budget accountability and public trust,” Nnadi argued.
He pointed out that on June 11, 2026, the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, had said that the PFIPC does not exist under the administration of President Bola Tinubu and cautioned the public to beware of anyone doing business with it.
However, Nnadi cited the 2026 Appropriation Act which listed the Presidential Economic Advisory Council/Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council under the Presidency with an allocation of about N1.3 billion inclusive of personnel, overhead and capital expenditure.
This discrepancy raises questions for him whether there is an error in the budget or whether the council exists in a certain official capacity despite the disclaimer from the Presidency.
Nnadi also mentioned the claims of Prince Adeniyi Adeyemi that the council has official accounts, office space and approved personnel, adding that such claims deserve independent verification by the relevant government agencies.
“He called on the Presidency and the Budget Office to make a clear statement on the matter, noting that resolving the issue is paramount to deepening public confidence in government budgeting and accountability processes.