Saraki Admits His DSS Detail Masterminded Robbery Of N310M (Photos)

Four days after SaharaReporters revealed that agents of the Department of State Security (DSS) assigned to Senate President Bukola Saraki had stolen N310 million from funds an operator of a bureau de change was transporting to the senator, a DSS source has told our correspondent that the heist was led by Abdulrasheed Hamidu Maigari and George Mwatapwa Ibbi, two top members of the senator’s security detail.
Mr. Hamidu became part of the senator’s security detail shortly after Mr. Saraki was elected President of the Senate.

Saraki’s DSS detail Abdulrasheed Ahmadu Maigari
“He [Mr. Hamidu] was the one who organized other participants in the robbery, including the soldiers,” the source said. In addition to the DSS agents, seven soldiers also took part in the operation.

SaharaReporters had exclusively disclosed that the agents and soldiers ambushed the owner of a bureau de change and forced him to hand over N310m out of the funds he was going to deliver to Mr. Saraki.

Mr. Hamidu, who hails from Dungo local government area in Taraba State, is a younger brother to Uba Maigari Hamidu, the deputy governor of Taraba State during former Governor Jolly Nyame’s administration.



The high-profile robbery took place on November 20, 2015, but both the DSS and Mr. Saraki worked in tandem to conceal the identity of the robbery suspects in order to spare the embattled senator from further public embarrassment.

After SaharaReporters broke the news, Mr. Saraki’s media team quickly reached major newspapers and bloggers in Nigeria to ensure that the senator’s involvement in the scandal was concealed.

In addition to the political cost to Mr. Saraki, the revelation that the stolen cash belonged to him bolstered reports about Mr. Saraki’s penchant for bribing judges in order to scuttle his trial at the Code of Conduct Tribunal.

SaharaReporters had recently revealed that Mr. Saraki had pressured officials at the Central Bank of Nigeria to pay him and another senator a sizeable hush amount after the two senators stumbled on information that former President Goodluck Jonathan and former National Security Adviser (NSA), Colonel Sambo Dasuki (ret.), had made numerous illicit withdrawals of funds at the CBN.
Since our publication, a source at the CBN as well as a security detail confirmed the hush payment and named Senator Andy Uba, a close ally of Mr. Saraki’s, as the other recipient of the hush funds.


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