Former Minister of Interior, Comrade Abba Moro, yesterday revealed that corruption and indiscipline in the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) assumed alarming proportion under the leadership of the suspended Comptroller- General, David Parradang. Moro, who made the revelation in a statement issued in Abuja and stated that all his efforts as minister to sanitise the systemic rot in the Service were severally frustrated by the suspended Comptroller-General.
President Muhammadu Buhari recently suspended Parradang, following investigations launched by the Federal Government into how a wanted suspected terrorist, Ahmad al-Assir, was granted a Nigerian visa in Lebanon to visit Nigeria. Moro stated that Parradang’s leadership disposition encouraged and promoted gross indiscipline. He said: “In the course of my duty as the Minister of Interior, I noticed Mr. Parradang demonstrated crash insubordination, complete disregard for constituted authority and indiscipline. Contrary to the vituperations of the hirelings in the Immigration Service, I fought hard to clean the rot and corruption in the Service.
“Rather than cooperate to reposition the Service, Mr. Parradang frustrated every of my efforts. Parradang frustrated all efforts to investigate Expatriate Quota administration abuse with allegations of illegal grant of Expatriate Quota by Immigration officers; frustrated all efforts by the committee on certificate forgery by setting up a parallel committee whose report never saw the light of day; Parradang frustrated all efforts to investigate contracts he awarded and paid for without contract execution.”
Disclosing reasons behind the immigration recruitment tragedy which led to the deaths of applicants across the country in 2014, the former minister explained that he decided to assist the Presidential Committee after Parrandang abandoned his duty of providing leadership to the board. He also alleged that under Parradang, there was manipulation of official records to either allow favourite officers stay longer in service or prevent others from being given promotion.
Moro further alleged that official records of officers Parradang didn’t want promoted were discovered missing. Just the same way records of officers who were supposed to have retired from the Service were manipulated to allow them stay longer and Parradang would frustrate their investigation.
The former minister also alleged that officers, under the leadership of Parradang, paid to be promoted and posted/deployed, which informed the introduction of External Examiners in the administration of promotion examinations by the ministry. He said: “As Minister, I introduced various reforms to curtail corruption in the Nigeria Immigration Service.
When complaints of certificate forgery were raised, I set a committee on certificate forgery. Again, Mr. Parradang frustrated the committee. “Across the Services in the Ministry of Interior, several serving officers have been found to have corrupted themselves, have been investigated, some dismissed and handed over to the Police for prosecution; some found guilty, some jailed in the Civil Defence, Prison and Fire Services.
A very senior officer of the Federal Fire Service who collected money of close to N100 million was investigated, found guilty for extorting money from unsuspecting members of the public and was handed over to the Police for prosecution. Yet an officer of the Nigeria Immigration Service under Mr. Parradang’s watch who was found guilty of a similar offence was shielded despite repeated directives for action against him.”
Denying his involvement in an illegal recruitment into the Immigration Service, Moro said: “It is pertinent to ask here; what has promotion/posting got to do with the present issue of illegal recruitment by Mr. Parradang and his Presidential Committee and Mr. Parradang’s insubordinate refusal to reverse the illegality as directed by a competent authority? What has Abba Moro got to do with that? In his paranoid desire to always disobey the Minister’s instructions, perhaps, Mr. Parradang thought I was still Minister giving instructions.” The former minister said that the allegation against him was an attempt to divert the attention of the public from the issue of illegal recruitment carried out under his watch.
