They were bold as boldness goes and posed as anti-corruption crusaders. They carried out advocacy even up to the doorsteps of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission EFCC. The commission embraced them as advocates of anti-corruption, but declined to give them permission to carry out its statutory functions.
The commission smelled a rat,but baited and waited for the tight gang of two men in their fifties, a 32 years old, and a band of hirelings.
Unfortunately for them, they attempted to scam a retired civil servant who knew his onions. There the bubble burst for them.
Swiftly, the Uyo Zonal Office of the EFCC swooped on them. They are presently cooling their heels in detention awaiting prosecution.
A narration of their exploits by EFCC spikesman, Wilson Uwujaren, reads like a Nollywood script, but only this is for real.
The three men were arrested in Uyo, the Akwa Ibom State capital for impersonating the staff of the EFCC and that of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission, ICPC. The suspects are: Norbert Rampa, (51); Patrick Essien, (50) and Gabriel Daniel,(32).
The trio along with other members of their team had on September 19, 2018, paid a courtesy visit to the Commission’s Uyo office, under the auspicies of Grassroots Development Advocacy Initiative (GDAI) which they claimed was a registered organisation with the National Anti-corruption Coalition (NACC).
During the visit, its national director, Essien spoke extensively on the several trainings that the members had gone through to ensure grassroots engagements in budget processes, aimed at sustaining the fight against corruption, while Rampa who introduced himself as the director of programmes of the group spoke on their robust collaboration with the ICPC.
They, however, requested that they be granted operational powers, to which the Zonal Head, Mr. Garba Dugum refused and advised them to rather report all perceived corrupt practices to the Commission.
The team obviously paid no heed to Dugum’s advice as Rampa, Essien and Daniel, who are the leaders, were discovered to have embarked on various levels of forgery and impersonation in a criminal act of extortion from unsuspecting members of the public, whom they deceive and intimidate with the claim that they are in a joint operational task force with both the EFCC and the ICPC.
Trouble, however, started for them when they tested their luck on Mr. Aloysius Udobong, an elderly retiree attempting to intimidate and extort money from him. Their move on Udobong failed, forcing them to send a baseless petition against him to the EFCC, concocting an allegation of being a corrupt retired public servant against him.
When Udobong was invited for questioning, he made allegations of forgeries and impersonation against the trio, buttressing them with documented evidence.
According to Udobong, sometime in 2018, the syndicate issued a letter of investigation to him, purportedly emanating from the EFCC and attempted to extort money from him, but when they discovered that he wasn’t willing to comply with their financial demands, they left, but returned to him in 2019 with more letters, this time, listing his assets and properties and threatening to prosecute him if he refused to dole out money to them.
Udobong tendered some of the letters of invitation for investigation which he claimed were all personally delivered to him by Rampa. This instantly turned the table against them and they became suspects.
The forged letters furthermore, pushed EFCC operatives to carry out a search on the apartments of the trio. The outcome of that search strongly established that Essien, Rampa and Daniel had been impersonating the EFCC and ICPC in the state and beyond.
Forged documents recovered from their apartments include: Fake EFCC letterhead papers, ICPC operational jackets, forged identity cards of National Anti-corruption Coalition of ICPC/EFCC Partnership, various forged letters to individuals and organisations purportedly coming from EFCC and ICPC. Others are: Forged investigation letters to First Bank of Nigeria, handwritten drafts of fake petitions against individuals, forged investigation letters from the suspects to their accuser, Mr. Udobong and a desktop computer.
Also included are a fake “National Anti-Corruption Coalition (NACC) of ICPC/EFCC Partnership,” letterhead paper that captured Norbert Rampa as “Head, Intelligence Investigator/Operations,” a forged EFCC letterhead paper with the Commission’s logo on the left hand side and the coat of arms on the right hand side and forged identity cards.
The suspects are currently providing useful information to the Commission and will be charged to court as soon as investigations are concluded.