An Abuja based lawyer, Elochukwu Obi, has dragged the senator representing the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Ireti Kingibe, before the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC), praying for investigation of the lawmaker over allegations bordering on abuse of office and fraud to the tune of N65 million.
The lawyer sought the senator’s probe by ICPC for allegedly defrauding a businessman, Mr Nonso Okafor.
In a petition presented to ICPC and received by the anti-graft agency, the businessman through his lawyer is accusing the senator alongside one of her Senior Legislative Aides (SLA), Mr. Osereme Christen Omofoma, of fraudulently obtaining the sum of $65,000 (Which was equivalent to N118,000,000, at that time), from him sometimes in October 2024.
In petition dated April 27, 2026 and addressed to the ICPC boss, the petitioner recalled how he was “deceitfully lured into paying the sum of $65,000 following intense persuasion exerted on him” by Omofoma.
Elochukwu Obi, counsel to the petitioner, who signed the petition on behalf of his client, claimed that the SLA had approached his client pleading with him to help “raise the sum of 100,000 USD, for the senator, to enable her meet urgent financial needs”.
According to him, the SLA promised that the money will be repaid in full or in the alternative, the senator will facilitate the award of contracts to the petitioner through which he will recoup his money.
“Initially, our client did not want to be part of the arrangement, especially as he did not have the huge amount of money that was demanded, at that material time.
“However, as a result of the enormous pressure exerted on our client by the SLA, our client was railroaded into borrowing, in order to meet up with the cash demand.
“Consequently, he resorted to borrowing from his friends. At the end, our client was able to raise the sum of 65,000 USD, out of the 100,000 USD that was initially demanded and this was borrowed at exorbitant rates.
“This money was paid to Senator Kingibe, in two tranches in October, 2024. The contract award promised to him was expected to come within a few weeks from the date of payment,” the petition read.
The lawyer noted that problem however started several months later when neither the money was repaid nor any contract awarded, adding that, “it dawned on our client that there was no contract for him, and that he had simply been misled”.
The petition disclosed that when the businessman began to ask for the refund of his money, the senator allegedly not only refused to refund the money but began to actively claim that she did not receive any money from him.
He said, following determination to get law enforcement involved in the matter, “they reluctantly decided to unilaterally pay only N50,000,000, out of the total 65,000 USD (N118,000,000). The payment was made in May 2025. After this, Senator Kingibe and her aide tried to compel our client to accept the payment as full and final, with threats to arrest him, if refuses to forego the balance”.
The lawyer stated that all appeals for the completion of the balance of N68,000,000, fell on deaf ears.
“Our client believes that the attitudes of Senator Ireti Kingibe and her SLA so far have been dodgy, deceptive and geared towards defrauding him of his money by leveraging on the shield provided by high governmental positions.
“Our client also strongly believes that there were no contracts for the senator to facilitate in the first place. In the contrary, the FACILITATION OF CONTRACT was a deceitful gimmick, which was deployed to fraudulently collect money from him, without any intention of refunding same.
“It is against the above backdrop that we bring this petition to the attention of your office. On behalf of our client, we most respectfully plead, that you urgently intervene and cause your officers to investigate this matter in order to determine whether there has been criminal infractions and abuse of public office.
“We also specifically plead for the recovery of the outstanding of N68,000,000 (Sixty Eight million Naira), which was deceitfully collected from our client and wrongfully retained by Senator Ireti Kingibe,” the petition added.
Meanwhile, when contacted, the senator did not respond to calls put across to her. She also did not reply messages sent to her via SMS and Whatsapp.
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