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Former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Bala Mohammed, has been arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Mohammed was arrested on Monday night and is currently in detention at the EFCC headquarters in Abuja.
He becomes the fifth aide of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, to be detained within a week. Others still in detention are Musiliu Obanikoro, a former Minister of state for defence; Femi Fani-Kayode, a Spokesperson for Jonathan’s re-election campaign last year, and Reuben Abati, the former president’s Spokesperson while in office.
Mohammed’s arrest comes just as another former FCT minister, Aliyu Modibbo, defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Modibbo served as Minister of State, Power and Steel as well as Minister of Commerce during the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo and was Minister of FCT under late President Umaru Yar’Adua.
According to sources, Mohammed is being investigated over alleged fake contracts valued at around N1bn and the allocation of 12 properties and 37 commercial plots of land to a suspected front. He is also being probed over a controversial Abuja land swap deal estimated to be around N1 trillion.
In contrast, Modibbo, a founding member of the PDP registered to become a member of the APC at the party’s office in his ward in Kumo West of Akko Local Government Area of Gombe State.