Naijaonpoint
The Federal Co-operative College Oji River sits in Enugu State. Under Provost Dr. Jude Ejikeme Obidiegwu, it executed 466 payments worth N38.23 billion that carry the unmistakable vocabulary of National Assembly constituency projects – ‘Federal Constituency’ and ‘Senatorial District’across 213 distinct constituencies, from Sokoto to Bayelsa to Lagos.
SecretsReporters dig into its payment records read like a national distribution manifest. On 16 February 2025, 22 companies were paid exactly ₦188,000,000 each for rice, grains and farm inputs to named constituencies: Dole International Company Limited for rice to Port Harcourt Federal Constituency II in Rivers; Bajem Trust Ltd for Yenagoa/Kolokuma-Opokuma in Bayelsa; Downtown International Limited for Etinan/Nsit Ibom/Nsit Ubium in Akwa Ibom; Place of Peace Investment Limited twice for Edo Central Senatorial District; Spatruk Group of Companies Limited for Bayelsa Central; Cloud High Limited for pesticides to Jigawa North East. Rice travelled to Ogbomoso North/South and Orire in Oyo State. Fertilizer moved to Edo Central. Pesticides and seedlings went to Jigawa.
One of the names on that manifest does not exist on the corporate register. The CAC public portal returns no record for Bajem Trust Ltd – the company paid N188,000,000 for rice to Yenagoa/Kolokuma-Opokuma under the printed name or under “Bajem Trust”. The Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020 makes CAC registration the gateway to corporate existence in Nigeria. The payment records show N188 million paid to a name the register does not know.
The college’s home state barely registers in its own spending. Enugu appears 24 times in project-location descriptions. Abia appears 67 times. Akwa Ibom 52. Imo 48. Delta 44. Anambra 42. A tertiary institution in Oji River spent more of its project language on other states than on its own.
None of the 1,182 payment records in the Obidiegwu era names any lawmaker. No “HON” and no “SENATOR” appears in any description. A Nigerian accountability civic body BudgIT has said the National Assembly inserted 1,142 projects worth N320 billion into the college’s 2025 budget, describing agencies used this way as “project warehouses”. Its sister NGO Tracka questioned a N1.08 trillion allocation for 2,791 projects tied to the college in the 2026 budget. Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar publicly faulted that allocation. Eighteen identical N266 million allocations totalling N4.788 billion for cholera interventions and solar water projects in Rivers State were tied to the college in the budget. The payment records in hand show what the warehouse model looks like in operation.
A search of public reporting found no commissioning, handover or beneficiary evidence matching any of the 21 named constituency projects checked; not the rice in Port Harcourt II, not the food items in Yenagoa/Kolokuma-Opokuma, not the grains in Aguata, not the fertilizer in Edo Central. Two civil-society groups, the Movement for Better Nation and the Good Governance Campaigners Network, said they visited project sites in Akwa Ibom and passed a vote of confidence on the Provost, rejecting project-duplication allegations; their reports did not name enough exact sites to match the payment descriptions, and the allegations they answered remain unverified claims, not established facts.
The Fiscal Responsibility Act requires public funds to be applied for their appropriated purposes and prohibits the misapplication of public money. An institution whose stated mandate is cooperative education, regulated by the National Board for Technical Education, disbursing N38.23 billion on federal-constituency and senatorial-district projects across the country, raises the question the Act was written to answer.
Source: …Secretsreporters