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By Gloria Ikibah

The House of Representatives has warned that it will issue a bench warrant for the arrest of the Managing Director of the Bank of Agriculture, Ayo Sontinrin, and Director-General of the Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria, Dr Abubakar Adamu Dabban.

Chairman House Committee on Nutrition and Food Security, Rep. Chike Okafor, gave the warning during the resumed investigative hearing of the committee on Tuesday, which is probing concerns surrounding the alleged mishandling of N1.2 trillion in agricultural intervention funds.

Rep. Okafor stated that the committee will take this step if the officials fail to appear before the panel as required.

He said: The Committee held the maiden Investigative Hearing on 8th April, 2025 with the Central Bank of Nigeria in attendance led by Hamman, Kwali John, Acting Director of the Finance Development Department among other notable invitees. The 2nd Hearing held on 16th June, 2025 with the attendance of Central Bank of Nigeria and the Participating Financial Institutions (PFIs) still indebted to CBN under the Anchor Borrower Programme. Sterling Bank’s representative absorbed the bank from any indebtedness to which the CBN responded through a letter to the Committee dated June 25th, 2025 to affirm the position of Sterling Bank that it does not have any outstandings.

“As the investigations went on, including forensic auditing and evaluation, few organizations have proven their innocence by honoring the invitations of the Committee, appearing before the Hearings, opening up their books with details answers to our inquiries and going extra miles to show verifiable evidences to support their claim of non-involvement in misuse of agricultural funding. Such organizations will be commended in the Committee’s Report to the House, at the end of the investigations.

“On the other hand, the Committee wants to put it in the public Know, that series of letters and invitations sent out to the following:  the Bank of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria, National Agricultural Land Development Council to appear before at the last two Hearings of this Committee, were met with either no response or very flimsy excuses for non-attendance. This is totally unacceptable. The Bank of Agriculture only responded with the excuse of having a new Managing Director and I wrote back to the MD to say, that the bank is an ongoing concern, that having a new MD is not enough reason not to honour the invitation of this panel.

“I  sincerely hope that the Bank of Agriculture and the Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria will be present tomorrow because the public hearing continues tomorrow. We are not the police but this a quasi-judicial institution. If we don’t see them tomorrow, we would have to invoke all the powers of the parliament to make them appear before us”.

The Committee has also requested a full set of documents and correspondence between Prospect Microfinance Bank and the Central Bank of Nigeria as part of its effort to clarify discrepancies in the figures declared by both institutions.

The Committee is seeking clarity on the total amount released to the bank, the handling of the six million naira recovered from beneficiaries, and several other outstanding matters.

This demand followed the appearance of the Managing Director of Prospect Microfinance Bank, Mr Isaac Inwang, who reported that the bank had received N14.6 million for disbursement to 30 poultry farmers. He explained that six million naira had been recovered and kept in the bank’s custody while awaiting further direction from the Central Bank.

The Central Bank, however, presented a conflicting account, stating that N15.5 million had been released to the microfinance bank. A senior official of the Bank, Hassan Tom, added that the bank had breached established procedures by failing to return recovered funds within the required timeframe, holding onto the money for more than three years.

In response to these inconsistencies, the Committee Chairman instructed Prospect Microfinance Bank to submit the requested documents on Wednesday, 19 November, and prepare to address several key concerns raised in both its own presentation and the Central Bank’s position on compliance with financial regulations.

In a related development, the Committee excused the National Agricultural Seeds Council after hearing from its Director-General, Alhaji Fatuhu Muhammed.

The Committee verified that the Council had no involvement in implementing or managing the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme, a point already confirmed by the Central Bank. The Chairman acknowledged the decision of the Director-General to honour the Committee’s invitation as a mark of respect for due process and his previous service as a Member of Parliament.

The House had earlier resolved, on Tuesday 1 July 2025, to mandate the Committees on Nutrition and Food Security, Agricultural Production and Services, Agricultural Colleges and Institutions, and Finance to undertake a broad investigation into the alleged misuse of government agricultural interventions and funding by agencies, schemes, and programmes operating outside the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security.