The African Democratic Congress and a chieftain of the All Progressives Grand Alliance, Chekwas Okorie, have rejected the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission’s interim report on the alleged fake Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council.

They, therefore, demanded an independent investigation into how the face council operated within government structures.

The criticism came after the ICPC’s interim findings recommended the prosecution of the principal suspect, Adeniyi Adeyemi, while indicating that there may have been other accomplices within government.

Commenting on the report on Saturday, the ADC described the ICPC findings as “predictable and inadequate.”

The party, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, accused the Federal Government of being more interested in containing the political damage caused by the scandal than uncovering the full circumstances surrounding it.

ADC recalled that it had opposed President Bola Tinubu’s decision to refer the matter to the ICPC, insisting instead on the establishment of an independent investigative panel.

The party said the interim report appeared to reduce the scandal to a failure of government procedures, despite evidence suggesting that the alleged PFIPC enjoyed several privileges ordinarily available only to legitimate government institutions.

“What Nigerians expected was an investigation into how a ‘fictitious agency’ managed to obtain all authorisations and institutional support required to operate as a legitimate government agency,” the party said.

The opposition party questioned how the alleged organisation secured office space within the federal secretariat complex, had civil servants deployed to it, reportedly received official vehicles and security support, and was allocated N1.3bn in the 2026 Appropriation Act if it had never legally existed.

The ADC argued that those developments could not reasonably be attributed to the actions of one individual acting alone.

“Budgetary provisions do not materialise by accident. They leave records, submissions, approvals and an audit trail,” the party said, demanding that investigators identify who proposed, processed and verified the N1.3bn allocation.

The party also raised questions over an appointment letter allegedly bearing the signature of the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila which investigators reportedly determined was forged.

According to the ADC, establishing that the document was forged does not resolve the larger issue of how the alleged deception passed through, several layers of government verification.

“How did a forged document survive the verification procedures of government?” the party asked, adding that investigators should determine who verified the existence of PFIPC before civil servants were deployed to it, who authorised its accommodation and which officials processed its dealings with other government institutions.

The party said, “If an investigation into one fake government agency leads investigators to two more, then the obvious question is no longer merely how one individual perpetrated an elaborate fraud.

“The question is how has this administration operated that made such systemic criminality possible?”

The ADC therefore called for the immediate publication of the complete ICPC interim report and demanded that every public official whose actions or negligence enabled the alleged entities to acquire official recognition and government privileges be identified and held accountable where wrongdoing is established.

Similarly, Okorie, in an interview with Sunday PUNCH, said the outcome of the ICPC investigation was not surprising, stating that the anti-corruption agency could not credibly investigate a matter involving the executive arm of government without questions about its independence.

“No reasonable Nigerian will be surprised at the outcome of the so-called ICPC investigation of the Adeyemi fake agency saga,” he said.

The APGA chieftain noted that the controversy required “a reputable, independent and open probe” covering the establishment, funding and operation of the alleged fake agency, which he described as being directly linked to the presidency.

According to Okorie, the ICPC’s position creates a situation in which “the accuser and the judge” appear to be the same party, given that the commission operates under the executive arm of government.

He also expressed doubts about the ability of the National Assembly to provide an effective alternative investigation, citing what he described as the legislature’s declining public confidence.