By Emma Ujah, Abuja Bureau Chief, Omeiza Ajayi & Dickson Omobola
LAGOS —AS the Federal Government, yesterday, filed an 8-count charge against Adeniyi Adeyemi, convener of a purported Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council, PFIPC, over the controversy trailing the agency, he fought back, claiming that he was given an appointmernt letter.
Adeyemi, who appeared on Channels Television claimed the Chief of Staff to the Prersident, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila gave him an appointmnent letter, insisting that he is not a criminal.
However, findings by Vanguard indicated that the alleged ‘‘fake’’ Presidential Economic Advisory Council/Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council was allocated N1.302 billion in the 2026 Budget of the Federal Government.
In a statement on Wednesday, Bayo Onanuga, presidential spokesperson, said the charges were filed by the Police on November 27, 2025, against Adeyemi and two accomplices at the Federal High Court in Abuja.
Onanuga said Adeyemi is expected to appear in court on July 27, 2026.
Onanuga said Femi Gbajabiamila, Chief of Staff to President Bola Tinubu, had alerted the Department of State Services, DSS, and the Nigeria Police Force, NPF, in October 2025, following complaints that the purported agency was operating alongside the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission, NIPC.
Onanuga added that Gbajabiamila told security agencies that forged appointment letters bearing his signature, reference numbers and official seals were being used to legitimise the fictitious agency.
Onanuga relayed that the Police arrested Adeyemi in Abuja on October 27, 2025, and recovered forged documents during searches of his office and residence.
“Based on their investigations, the Police filed an eight-count charge at the Federal High Court in Abuja against Adeyemi and two of his accomplices on November 27, 2025. He is due in court on July 27,” Onanuga said.
“Adeyemi was on police bail when he recently claimed that the Chief of Staff had appointed him Director-General of the fictitious agency.”
The presidential spokesperson had also said that Adeyemi told the Police that one Dolapo Babatunde Tanimola assisted him in procuring the fake appointment letter.
“Following his claim, the Police went after the said Tanimola. The Police found that Tanimola died in a fire incident at Kachi Hotel in Abuja on October 22, five days before Adeyemi’s arrest,” Onanuga said.
He further stated: “Tanimola’s body was seen by the Police at the morgue, confirming the death.
‘‘The Police were able to establish that the agency Adeyemi purportedly headed was fictitious, that he forged his appointment letter and the documents recovered in his office and home, that he falsely paraded himself as a government appointee, and that he falsely solicited a note verbale from the Foreign Affairs Ministry to enable him and his staff to obtain US visas.”
In June 11, 2026, Gbajabimila, in a statement, said the purported Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council does not exist under the current administration.
He also denied that his office appointed an individual named Adeniyi Adeyemi for the organisation.
Adeyemi had challenged the statement released by Gbajabimila on June 11.
He questioned how the purported agency allegedly appeared in the 2026 budget if, as maintained by the Presidency, the body does not exist.
FG budgeted N1.3b for “fake” Council
However, findings by Vanguard indicated that the alleged ‘‘fake’’ Presidential Economic Advisory Council/Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council was allocated N1.302 billion in the 2026 Budget of the Federal Government.
The budget showed that the provision was made under the Presidency, with Code number: 0111062001 and Expenditure Item number 18. The summary of the budget for the Council was contained on Page 4 of the budget document, while the breakdown was contained on pages 50 and 51 of the 2,790-page 2026 Budget.
According to the detailed budget, N802.978 million was allocated for personnel of the Council, N200 million for overhead, while Capital was allocated N300 million.
Vanguard made concerted efforts to get the Director-General of the Budget Office of the Federation, Mr. Tanimu Yakubu, to explain the budgetary provisions for the ‘‘fake’’ Council, without success.
The Presidency, on Wednesday night, denied existence of the Council purportedly headed by Prince Adeniyi Adeyemi as Director-General.
The presidency accused Adeyemi of being an impersonator, leaving the public with serious questions, requiring answers from the Federal Government.
Vanguard wanted to know who presented the Council’s budget proposal to the Budget Office for review and who defended the budget of the Council before officials of the Budget Office, and why it was included in the Presidential Executive Budget.
My side of the story — Adeyemi
Responding to the position taken by the Federal Government, Adeyemi issued a statement saying, ‘‘I will not be intimidated because intimidation I condone not. I will not be discredited without response because you cannot beat a child and expect him/her not to cry. When pain is inflicted, a response is inevitable. And I will not allow my name to be used as a convenient shield in a matter that Nigerians deserve full transparency on.
‘‘I will rather die as a man than to live as a coward.’’
He further raised some posers around the saga and stated: ‘‘I reject outright any attempt to reduce this matter to simple denials without addressing the core questions that Nigerians are now asking.
The issue is no longer about personalities, it is about contradictions that demand answers.
‘‘How did the agency’s name get into the 2026 appropriation budget pages 50 and 51? If the agency does not exist, yet found its way into the Nigerian national budget, what that means is that the entire 2026 Appropriation Act is a fraud and should be discarded.
‘‘For President Tinubu to append his signature to a budget that includes a non-existing agency according to his Chief of Staff, is an embarrassment to this hardworking government.
‘‘Why do questions persist regarding administrative processes, budgetary lines, and institutional communications allegedly connected to this Agency if it doesn’t exist?
‘‘The same acclaimed non-existent Agency has domiciliary account, pounds account and Treasury Single Account, all domiciled in Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN.”
Adeyemi appeared on a television interview last night to throw more light on his side of the story.
Asked whether he was running away from the law, he said: “Not at all.”
Asked whether he was ready to face the law, he said: “Definitely, if I am wrong, let the court of law do that; if I am right, let the court of law do the right thing. Do you know what? Since the matter is in court, let the court of competent jurisdiction vindicate me because I am ready to clear my name. Let the law take its course.
‘‘Since my lawyers are involved, everybody will follow us, they will monitor the whole thing. Let the court of competent jurisdiction do the needful.
‘‘I have a letter of appointment. However, since the matter is in the court, I won’t be able to say much about it, I am on medication. I am a bit down, I am sick.”
On whether Gbajabiamila has knowledge about his appointment, he said: “Yes.”
On whether he got the confirmation of appointment through Gbajabiamila’s office, he said: “Yes, let the court vindicate all those things.”
On his message to Nigerians regarding the issue, he said: “I want Nigerians to know that, for one second, let us assume the agency does not exist, would I have the temerity, the audacity, to be going all over the country, meeting the head of ministry, department and agency, if I know that the agency does not exist, or as they allege that I cooked up everything? No Nigerian can dare do that. I could not have summoned the courage to be going from one place to another for almost three years. Nigeria is not a banana republic.”
Tinubu’s govt held hostage by fraudsters, Atiku declares
Meanwhile, former Vice President and presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, Atiku Abubakar, has said that the Presidency’s attempt to explain away the scandal surrounding the so-called Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council, PFIPC, has exposed a government held hostage by fraudsters operating from within the very institutions established to protect the Nigerian state.
In a statement, yesterday by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, Atiku said the response by Presidential Spokesperson, Onanuga, was not a defence of the government but a public confession of institutional collapse.
“There is an African proverb which says that ‘the man who points at the moon should not have blood on his finger.’ A government cannot claim to be exposing fraud while simultaneously struggling to explain how that same fraud found its way into the very heart of the Nigerian state.
“Rather than extinguish the fire, it has illuminated how deeply the flames have consumed the foundations of governance,” he said, arguing that the official explanation asks Nigerians to believe that one private citizen single-handedly forged presidential documents, impersonated senior government officials, established an office inside the Federal Secretariat, opened dozens of bank accounts bearing government identities, hosted foreign ambassadors without diplomatic clearance and embedded a phantom agency into the machinery of government without any insider assistance. “That explanation demands far greater faith than the scandal itself,” he said.
Atiku described the scandal as exposing institutions hollowed out by years of negligence, incompetence and impunity, likening it to termites that consume a tree from within until “the first storm.”
He cited a glaring contradiction in the Presidency’s position, noting that while officials insist the PFIPC never existed, public records reportedly show that approximately N1.3 billion was appropriated for the council in the 2026 Appropriation Act, alongside the Presidential Economic Advisory Council.
“If the agency was fictitious, who prepared the budget estimates bearing its name? Which ministry submitted them? Which officials defended those estimates before the National Assembly? Which committees scrutinised them? Which lawmakers approved them? Who inserted the allocation into the Appropriation Bill? And ultimately, who signed that budget into law?” he asked.
He accused the National Assembly of legislative abdication for failing to detect the anomaly or demand explanations before an allegedly fictitious agency made its way into the national budget. He also questioned the CBN over how the alleged agency navigated financial processes that ordinary businesses struggle to complete, and criticised the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, for what he called selective zeal in pursuing opposition figures while showing hesitation toward allegations touching the corridors of power. “Anti-corruption loses all credibility when it becomes selective prosecution,” he said.
Atiku maintained that regardless of whether the episode was an elaborate fraud aided by insiders or a catastrophic failure of governance, the conclusion remains that government failed. “A government that cannot protect the integrity of its own budget cannot be trusted with the destiny of over 200 million Nigerians,” he said.
While acknowledging that Adeyemi may ultimately answer before the courts, Atiku insisted the Presidency could not prosecute one man while refusing to explain the institutional contradictions that made his alleged activities possible.
He described the scandal as having become “a metaphor for the President Tinubu administration itself,” and demanded a truly independent investigation that follows the evidence wherever it leads, with no sacred cows, no political protection and no selective justice.
“The fictitious agency saga stands as yet another compelling reason why Nigerians must reject this administration and rescue their country from a government that has become a hostage to incompetence, institutional decay, and those who profit from both,” he said.
