The Kogi State Staff Screening Appeal Committee has ordered the arrest of a staff of the State Pension Board, Mr. Atabor John Momoh for allegedly defrauding numerous pensioners of their allowances to the tune of N4.3million in 2015 alone.
According to a statement issued in Lokoja by the Director General Media and Publicity of the Kogi State Staff Screening Appeal Committee, Evangelist Kingsley Fanwo, in the course of reviewing the bank statement of Mr. Atabor John Momoh, it was discovered that he purportedly diverted funds meant for payment of pensioners’ allowance into his personal account.
Our Kogi State Correspondent reports that Mr. Momoh who was said to have huge cash inflow in his account in the last screening exercise, is in-charge of reconciliation of failed payment in the State Pension Board and was alleged to have substituted pensioners account with his salary account number.
In a swift reaction, Mr Atabor John Momoh reportedly said the reason for his low net monthly salary was as a result of the repayment of loan he took from Albarka Multipurpose Cooperative Society and affirmed that it was because of the financial stress arising from his meagre salary that forced him to manipulate the system to his advantage.
He further explained that the method adopted to manipulate the various sums of money credited to his account was through the preparation of manual schedules for failed bank transactions.
According to Mr. Momoh, the manual payment schedules were usually approved by the Director of Account, Hajia Amina Haruna.
Evangelist Kingsley Fanwo added that besides the legitimate salary of Mr. Momoh, he was fraudulently paid over two hundred and forty seven thousand naira in the month of March and April 2015, while over three hundred and twenty five thousand naira was allegedly paid into his account for the month of May 2014 and March 2016.
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