President Buhari terminates defence procurement contract by the Minister for Transport, Rotimi Amaechi, over allegations of fraud

President Muhammadu Buhari has reportedly terminated a new defence procurement contract which was said to have been midwived by the Minister for Transport, Rotimi Amaechi, over allegations of fraud

According to Premium Times, Buhari's Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari, earlier this week dispatched a memo directing the Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, to terminate the contract

The President was also said to have ordered the National Security Adviser and the Nigerian Intelligence Agency to investigate how the contractor obtained security clearance for the job without an end-user certificate

Buhari also reportedly ordered that the contractor should be made to supply items equivalent to the $50 million upfront payment which they received recently

If the contract had pulled through, the contractor, HSLi, would have received $195 million in payment for the sale of an undisclosed number of special mission aircraft, special mission helicopters and 12 fast intervention vessels for the Nigerian Navy

The contract was signed off by the Federal Executive Council in December 2017