Civil servant bags 28 years jail term over N86.1m contract fraud

A civil servant, Ma’aji Shettima Arfo, has been convicted and sentenced to 28 years imprisonment for engaging in an N86.1 million contract fraud by Justice Haruna Mshellia, of the Borno State High Court, 3.

Arfo, who was the General Manager of the state-owned Maiduguri Flour Mills Limited, where he committed the fraud, was charged on a six-count by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) for offences bordering on abuse of office and conferring undue advantage on himself.

According to the charge sheet, Arfo, while acting as the General Manager of the Flour Mill, between 2014 and 2020, engaged in multiple frauds in violation of Sections 12 and 19 of the Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Act, 2000 and punishable under relevant sections of the same Act.

One of the counts on which he was convicted revealed that he awarded multiple contracts to Falkwat Multilinks Limited, a private company where he was a director, to supply diesel (Automotive Gas Oil) and maize to Maiduguri Flour Mills.

Counsel to ICPC, Anas Mohammed Kolo, in his argument, told the court that the convict in October 2015, awarded a N4.9 million contract to Falkwat Multilinks Limited to supply 40,000 litres of diesel to the flour mills.

The court further heard how Arfo, while being a public servant, awarded several contracts between 2016 and 2017 to his private company, Falkwat Multilinks Limited, to supply maize to Maiduguri Flour Mills Limited.

For instance, he authorized the payments of N42.1 million to his company in July 2016 for the supply of 386.45 metric tonnes of maize and another N23 million to the same company in March 2016 to supply 306.94 metric tonnes of maize to the state-owned flour mills.

He was convicted for yet another offence when he approved the payment of N16 million to Falkwat Multilinks to supply 217.45 metric tonnes of maize.

Justice Mshellia, however, found the General Manager guilty of four counts out of six preferred against him and sentenced him to seven years imprisonment on each count.

The judge ruled that prison terms will run concurrently.