The Police Service Commission (PSC) has announced the inauguration of an in-house panel to probe the bribery allegations against Abba Kyari, a Deputy Commissioner of Police and suspended former Head of the Intelligence Response Team (IRT) of the Inspector General of Police.
According to a statement released in Abuja on Thursday by Ikechukwu Ani, spokesman of the PSC, the new panel is headed by Tijani Mohammed, a lawyer and Director, Department of Police Discipline in the Commission.
The statement, titled ‘PSC waits for Abba Kyari report, sets up in-house panel, also clarified that the panel will examine the facts of the allegations as contained in the Federal Bureau of Investigation indictment and also look at the extant rules “as a means of keeping abreast of the matter” pending the submission of the report by the Special Investigation Panel earlier set up by the Inspector-General of Police, Usman Baba.
It explained that the panel would “gather and document relevant information on DCP Abba Kyari given his disciplinary matter and to analyze the information gathered and make appropriate recommendation/s to the commission”.
“The report of the in-house panel is expected to assist the commission take an informed decision when the investigative panel report is submitted for the commission’s consideration,” read the statement.
“The commission had also directed the Inspector-General of Police to furnish it with information on further developments on the matter for necessary/further action.”
The panel was inaugurated by the Permanent Secretary/ Secretary to the Commission, Alhaji Abubakar Ismaila, and has started its work while the commission awaits the report of the DIG Joseph Egbunike-led investigative panel on the matter.
Kyari is being probed after a report by the FBI indicted him in a $1.1 million internet scam allegedly carried out by a quintet led by Abbas Ramon, an Instagram influencer better known as Hushpuppi.
FIJ initially reported how, in his former role as Commissioner of Police in charge of Budget and Finance at the Nigeria Police Force Headquarters, Joseph Egbunike, head of the police internal panel probing Kyari, joined other police chiefs to approve more than N1billion for sham police transit camps project in Benue, Bauchi, Plateau, Katsina and Kano
