Ganduje’s appointee moves against him, accuses APC National Chairman of mismanaging N51.3bn Kano LG funds  

These are not the best of times for the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Abdullahi Ganduje.
Hours after some Executive Members of his Ward in Kano State suspended him over alleged corruption, an action which was upturned by the State Working Committee (SWC) of the party, the Kano State Anti-Corruption and Public Complaints Commission has told Ganduje, the immediate past governor of the North-West state, that he has no place to hide.
The Chairman of the anti-graft commission, Muhuyi Magaji, said this on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme on Tuesday.
Incidentally, it was Ganduje who appointed Magaji to head the agency in 2015 and re-appointed him in 2020 for another five-year term.
In fact, the commission has filed fresh charges of corruption and maladministration against Ganduje, who was governor of the 57-year-old state from 2015 to 2023.
“What is happening now is a tip of the iceberg. As I am talking to you, we are investigating a case whereby N51.3bn local government funds were directly taken from government coffers and sent to individuals, and we traced the money to people”, Magaji said.
Magaji alleged that the Ganduje administration took N1 billion from the state coffers a month to the expiration of the administration’s tenure in May 2023 but the money was sent to Bureau de Change operators and not used for road renovation as earmarked.
“We have piled series of cases. We have a case whereby N1 billion in April last year (2023) was removed from government coffers under the allocation of renovating 30 roads in the metropolis and it was taken away, sent to Bureau de Change.
“We have a case of N4 billion whereby it was sent from the consolidated revenue account of Kano State to an agricultural company. All these cases are before the court,” he said. 
The Kano anti-graft chairman, who said he was being viewed as a “stubborn person” in some quarters, insisted that the court ruled that money laundering was a federal offence but the commission has the right to probe alleged corruption and maladministration by the Ganduje administration.
Magaji said though he was appointed by Ganduje to head the agency, he won’t hesitate to prosecute alleged corruption by the immediate-past administration in the state.
He said: “Incidentally, His Excellency, the former governor was the one that appointed me in 2015 to head the agency and I was re-appointed in 2020 for another five-year term. Basically, we have an institution in the Public Complaints and Anti-Corruption Commission that is devoid political activities and dedicated to fight corruption, check maladministration and fight injustice”.
Magaji said he started investigating Ganduje when he was governor. He said there should be no sacred cows in the anti-corruption fight in the state.
“That is the beauty of what we are doing. In Nigeria, we are not supposed to have those that will be shielded. Even, we that are in the anti-corruption agency, our integrity has been tested. And that is how it is supposed to be. Anybody that is charged before the court of law, let him go and answer”.
Ganduje will appear before a Kano High Court on Wednesday on charges bordering on allegations of bribery, diversion and misappropriation of funds, including the purported acceptance of $413,000 and N1.38bn in bribes.
Because of the series of scandal, Ganduje has been under pressure to resign his position as APC National Chairman.