Nigeria to lose N3trn to contract scams by 2025 – Institute

The Chartered Institute of Forensics and Certified Fraud Investigators of Nigeria (CIFCFIN) has warned that Nigeria may lose N3 trillion to contract scams, procurement fraud, fraudulent court judgments and other related frauds by 2025.

President and Chairman of the institute’s governing council, Dr Iliyasu Gashinbaki, said this on Sunday in Abuja at the 2023 International Fraud Awareness Week.

He warned that something concrete must be done to stop the fraud that he said was causing the federal, state and local governments an annual cumulative loss of about N1.4trn based on credible intelligence.

He said that Bloomberg, in 2022 alone, revealed that Nigeria made a settlement payment of $496m (N418.625bn at today’s exchange rate of N844 to one US dollar at the Import & Export-I & E- window) to Global Steel Holdings Ltd (GSHL), a company with headquarters in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) which concession to Ajaokuta Steel Company was earlier revoked as it was accused of asset stripping by the federal government.