President Bola Tinubu has ordered the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission to investigate allegations that a body called the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council was set up inside his office, even though the presidency says the agency never existed. The commission has been told to submit a comprehensive report within 30 days.
The move puts Adeniyi Adeyemi Matthew back at the centre of a case that now spans forgery claims, impersonation allegations and questions over how a council said to be fake ended up in the public record. Police are seeking him, and he has said he is innocent, fears for his life and will appear in court to clear his name.
That search has intensified because the dispute is not just about a title on paper. The presidency says the letter that was meant to create the PFIPC carried a forged signature from Femi Gbajabiamila, and police forensic analysis is said to have backed that finding. Charges filed before the Federal High Court in Abuja accuse Adeyemi and two other defendants of using forged official documents to establish and operate the council, opening multiple bank accounts in its name and seeking official recognition for an agency the government says does not exist.
He has pushed back hard. Adeyemi says the body was lawfully established and says it was set up in 2024 to attract foreign investment to Nigeria. He also accused senior government officials of demanding bribes during his appointment and later trying to take control of the council’s funds. The presidency has denied those allegations.
What makes the case harder to dismiss is the paper trail around the PFIPC. News Pidgin found office space in the Federal Secretariat in Abuja, bank accounts with the Central Bank of Nigeria and a listing in the 2026 Appropriation Act with an allocation of 1.3bn naira. But the Accountant-General's Office says the council never had an operational account with the central bank and never received any public funds or salaries, a gap that raises the central question in the case: how did something described as nonexistent acquire the trappings of a real agency?
The pressure on Tinubu has only grown as civil society organisations, opposition politicians and senior lawyers call for an independent inquiry. He says the integrity of the Presidency and federal institutions must be protected against impersonation, forgery, abuse of official identity and the exploitation of weaknesses in the public service, and that all those found culpable should be treated strictly in accordance with applicable law. For Adeyemi, the 30-day clock now defines the next phase of a dispute that could decide whether he is seen as the head of a sham council or the victim of a forged bureaucracy.
