Helicopter sale: NCAT director, auctioneer arrested over sale of 2 helicopters at $1.2 million

…ask IGP to take over probe, prosecute offenders ….as Nigeria Army seek recovery of sold helicopters now in US

By Christiana Ekpa

The House of Representatives on Tuesday ordered the immediate arrest of an alleged unlicensed auctioneer and NCAT’s Director of Quality Control by the Police in the National Assembly for allegedly providing false information on oath, and the sale of 2 helicopters for 1.2 million dollars.
This is also as the Committee on Public Assets called on the Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, to take over the investigation of alleged indiscriminate sale of two helicopters by the Nigeria College of Aviation Technology, NCAT.
The resolution of the Committee on Public Assets came after about five hours of interaction with the management of the College and other relevant bodies.
Recall that in December, 2023, the House launched an investigation into the state of public assets in the country.
The committees mandate is to recover assets valued at trillions of naira and moribund public assets within and outside Nigeria and to unravel reasons behind the hurried sale of two helicopters without the approval of the Federal Executive Council days to the end of the Buhari administration in 2023
Present at the Commitee were the management team of NCAT, representatives of the Nigerian Army and others crucial to .
The chairman of the Commitee,Ademorin Kuye expressed worries that the two choppers bought at $2.4 billion were sold at $1.2 billion without due process.
“We requested for documents of any kind of joint venture, there is no response to that whether you have one or you do not have.
“We requested for list of assets including comprehensive description and specifications of all your list assets, rented apartments including acquisition dates and methods and the current status and conditions of such Assets. We can not say specifically that you have satisfied all of these requests. Though you tried to answer some of them, your response are not adequate” Hon Kuye said.
The lawmakers also queried the use of an umlicensed auctioneer who failed to provide needed response to enquiries
In his reaction, Musa Alkali, Coordinator Nigerian Army Aviation said that the request by Army to make use of the helicopters in the fight against terrorism was turned down, he however demanded that the two helicopters should be recovered.
A member of the committee, Midala Balami, said that the document presented to the commitee were false documents.