Four officers of the Police Service Commission, Abuja are to appear in court on April 20, 2011 to answer a 14-count charge brought against them by the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission. They were arraigned for allegedly inserting pseudo names into the payroll of the commission between May 2009 and March 2010.


According to a statement signed by Head, Public Enlightenment Department of the commission, Mike Sowe, the officers, who are staff of the Accounts Division of the Commission, include Jonathan Abutu Attah, Francis Nwabundu, Imam Yaqub Ishaq and Mrs Ramatu Ibrahim.They are accused of illegally enriching themselves by inserting ghost names into the payroll of the Commission.


ICPC investigators discovered that the suspects allegedly used various bank accounts with the United Bank for Africa, Intercontinental Bank, Guarantee Trust Bank, and Zenith Bank to perpetrate the crime. It was gathered during investigation that the scam was initiated by Jonathan Abutu Attah, the shedule officer in charge of Salary Mandate Register at the Central Pay Office of the Police Service Commission Abuja. He was said to be the main beneficiary of the fraud.


Francis Nwabundu, the shedule officer with the internal audit in charge of vetting payment vouchers, is also accused of passing salary payment vouchers to the Central Pay Office while deliberately refusing to detect the pseudo names he knew had been fraudulently inserted into the payroll.


Imam Yaqub Ishaq, the shedule officer with the Salary Unit in charge of entering pay roll into the Vote Book, is charged with deliberately refusing to detect the pseudo names while passing the Personnel Vote Book to the internal audit for checking.


The four accused persons, according to the statement, will appear before Justice Ishaq Bello of the FCT High Court.

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