NIRSAL Denies Sacking Auditor To Cover Up ‘Multi-Billion Fraud’

The Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing system for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) has denied a recent report that it sacked its head of internal audit to cover up alleged fraud in the organization.

NIRSAL was reacting to a report recently published by an online news medium titled: “EXPOSED: How Managing Director of NIRSAL, Aliyu Abdulhameed, Dismissed Olalekan Olusanya, Head of Internal Audit to Cover Up Multi-Billion Naira Fraud”.

The organization said contrary to the claim in the report that it dismissed the said staff to cover up fraud allegations against its Managing Director, “The story is anchored on a non-existent foundation”.

It said, “the main source of the invented “multi-billion fraud” in NIRSAL is a disgruntled former staff who fled NIRSAL while facing disciplinary action for breaching the terms of his employment.”

NIRSAL said Olusanya was fired from the organization after investigations revealed, “his serial breaches of a number of the organization’s laid down policies.”

It noted that, “While at NIRSAL, Olusanya, a mid-level staff who falsely claimed in the Sahara Reporters story that he was Head of Internal Audit at NIRSAL, violated many internal processes and took many unprofessional and dishonest actions that put both the institution and his fellow staff at risk.

“One of such actions was that Olusanya compromised staff confidential information for monetary gain by archiving and illegally exposing the said information to outside parties.

“Olusanya’s action was against the clear provisions of NIRSAL’s policies which state: “Treat and safeguard all information as strictly private and confidential and exercise all reasons and care to preserve the confidentiality of same and prevent the unauthorized access to same by unauthorized persons through failure to exercise due care and diligence or through negligence, recklessness”.

“This act, unfortunately, led to the kidnap of some NIRSAL staff who were told by the kidnappers that they had the dossiers on NIRSAL staff salaries, their location and family contacts.”

NIRSAL further denied allegations of “multi-billion fraud” against its MD, saying its was impossible for anyone to commit fraud in the organization due its “technical capital structure”.

It said, “no one in the organization has access to any “funds”. The public, including Sahara Reporters, can be forgiven if they display a certain degree of limited knowledge of what NIRSAL Plc is.

“Contrary to the narrative being pushed by entrenched negative economic interests over the last 12 months, trying to sabotage the clear progress being made by this 4year old organization, NIRSAL Plc is not swimming in cash, does not see cash and its operations are not funded by either an appropriation of the Federal Government of Nigeria or through an allocation of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

“NIRSAL’s total capital structure is based on a debenture loan. Perhaps more important to note is that this capital structure is technical in nature, not physical and it is controlled within the CBN system.”