The management of the Federal Fire Service (FFS) has asked the general public to ignore allegations of fraud and nepotism in the Service as reported by an online media.
In a statement made available to newsmen Friday in Abuja, FFS’s Public Relations Officer, SF Ugo Huan, who described the allegations as ‘baseless’, said the management would have ignore the report as reported by Sahara reporters as the medium did not reach out to the Service to get the facts of the story.
Huan said: “The Federal Fire Service under the current leadership of Liman Alhaji Ibrahim has ensured that the Service is open and transparent in its dealings, as well as ensuring fairness to all staff. As a man who hates injustice, he has always ensured that everyone is treated fairly and giving what is due to him or her.
“We read with dismay a publication by Sahara reporters published online on the 10th December 2020 with the caption ” Federal Fire Service Officers Expose Fraud, Nepotism in Kaduna Office.”
“Ordinarily, we would have chosen to ignore this baseless allegation as reported by Sahara reporters as they did not reach out to the Service to get the facts of the story to balance their story, but went ahead to report a hearsay story without proper investigation. But we must state the facts.
“It is shocking and absurd to hear of such allegations of fraud and nepotism coming from staff of the Service in Kaduna Command as alleged by Sahara Reporters as this can not be true.”
The statement explained that for the record, payment of allowances were not made by the State Commands, “they are approved and paid from the headquarters so alleging that the Kaduna State Office did not pay Covid-19 allowances is not true. All those who were involved in Covid-19 special assignments were paid their allowances from the headquarters. While salaries are paid from the office of the Accountant General of the Federation.As we speak up to date salaries have been paid to all staff of the Federal Fire Service.
“Secondly, no transfer is illegal or could be said to be preferential. All Officers and Men of the Service are duty-bound to comply with all transfers whenever their services are needed elsewhere. Meanwhile, the Service is presently carrying out the deployment of staff to states with limited staff who just got firefighting trucks from states with a large number of staff like Kaduna State. So it is not true to allege that some Senior Officers within the Kaduna State commands are transferring staff for whatsoever reasons.
“It is pertinent to note that there are no cases of fraud or nepotism within the Federal Fire Service.
“Finally, we want to employ the general public to ignore these allegations as they are not true.
“We also want to advise Sahara Reporters to always cross-check with the Service on any matter concerning the Service before going to the public with a one-sided story as our doors are always open to provide information when approached.”
