N17m bribe: Onyeka Onwenu fails to honour ICPC’s Invite

Songstress and director general of the National Centre for Women Development (NCWD), Onyeka Onwenu, on Friday failed to show up at the office of Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) which had invited her to shed more light on an alleged N17million contract bribe in her organisation.
It was gathered that she was unable to honour the agency’s invitation due to health reasons.
Onwenu’s personal assistant, Chika Abazu, was on July 10 arraigned before an Abuja High Court on a six-count charge of bribery and gratification.
He is accused of having collected a kickback of N17 million from a contractor to facilitate a contract from the NCWD.
According to a reliable source at the ICPC headquarters in Abuja, the NCWD DG said she had to attend to a health challenge.
The source further noted that the chairman of the ICPC will explore all options, including giving Onwenu a new date in order to ensure that she answers her part in the whole N17 million bribery allegation.

Read also: ICPC goes after wealthy civil servants

“In line with our investigations into the alleged N17 million bribery for contract at the NCWD, we decided it was high time we summoned the DG to say her part of the story. Though, she had declined to honour our invitation, we believe that with the arraignment of her PA, Chika Abazu, we need to complete the other leg of our investigation because findings have shown that some officials of NCWD were also implicated in the bribery scandal.
“While we integrogated other key persons like Mukhtar Usman, Jauro Jibrin and Sadeeq Umar on the same issue yesterday, it has come to the turn of the DG,” the source stated.
When arraigned in court, Abazu had pleaded not guilty to the charges but was denied bail and ordered to be remanded in the Federal Prisons, Kuje, until the case is dispensed with.
The presiding judge, Justice Chukwu Ndukwe, adjourned the case till September 28 for trial.
One Joseph Nwakama, an architect with Solidmark Associates Limited, the company employed by the NCWD to carry out the renovation of its guest house petitioned the ICPC that Abazu demanded and collected N17m as kick back for the contract.
He however confirmed that there is no link to Onwenu in the crime yet as investigations show that it was her aid, Abazu that was involved.

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