In November 2010, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) arraigned Siemens AG alongside four Nigerian civil servants allegedly involved in a $17.5 million bribery scandal. The suspects were alleged to have between 2002 and 2006 accepted financial gratification in excess of 17.5 million euros from Siemens in a bid to influence the award of power and communication contracts.
The four persons were a former Director of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, Maigada Shuaibu, former Chief Executive Officer of M-Tel, Edwin Moore Momife, ex-General Manager of Finance in NITEL, Emmanuel Chukwuemeka Ossai and a former Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Power and Steel, Mahmood Sadiq Mohammed.
Shortly after, Siemens agreed to pay the Nigerian government the sum of N7 billion as penal fines in return for the discontinuation of the criminal charges instituted against the company by the EFCC.
The Nigerian case wasn’t an isolated one. Around the world – from Bangladesh, Vietnam, Russia, and Mexico to Greece, Norway and Iraq – Siemens paid bribes to government officials and civil servants to help the company secure huge contracts.
The bubble burst for Siemens following a 2006 raid on the company headquarters by the German police. Following the US and German prosecutions, Siemens paid more than $1.6 billion in fines, penalties and disgorgement of profits, including $800 million to US authorities – the largest monetary sanction ever imposed in a case under America’s Foreign Corruption Practice Act since it was passed in 1977.
Back to the Nigerian scandal. Investigations revealed that in the early 2000s, Kabir Adamu, an officer of the Nigerian Intelligence Agency (NIA), was routinely posted to the Nigerian embassy in Berlin, Germany. It was while serving there that he met Siemens officials who were scouring for middlemen to influence the award of power and communications contracts in their home countries. They found an ally in Adamu, the new NIA officer on Berlin.
Siemens sources disclosed that Adamu got over 750,000 Euros to facilitate meetings between their officials and those of the Nigerian government. Overnight, he became one of the richest Nigerians in Germany.
Pointblanknews.com checks revealed that Adamu’s sudden and inexplicable wealth became a source of worry to his colleagues at the Nigerian embassy in Berlin. So much so that it attracted the attention of their boss at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Ahmed Magaji. However, at the time, nobody at the embassy could point to the source of Adamu’s sudden wealth, sources explained.
“When Ambassador Magaji, who passed on last October, tried to investigate how Adamu, a middle-cadre security operative came about the kind of money he was spending in Germany and in Nigeria, the young officer called his bluff.
“He boasted to his colleagues in the NIA that he wouldn’t respond to the query from Ambassador Magaji, and that heavens would not fall. That he had made enough money to last a lifetime, and cared less about their ‘nonsensical NIA and Nigeria.’
“When the National Security Adviser (NSA) (at the time), General Aliyu Gusau, tried to investigate reports on why such a relatively young officer in the intelligence service would be so unruly, Adamu didn’t budge. At this point, the NIA fired him,” offered impeccable NIA sources.
Former officials of Siemens who spoke to Pointblanknews.com on the matter, expressed surprise that no mention of Adamu was made in the course of investigating the scandal in Europe and in Nigeria.
“That the guy was able to elude investigators in Germany and Nigeria suggests that he must be very good at covering his tracks. More shocking is that he is now said to be the most respected and influential security and intelligence expert and consultant in West Africa,” one former Siemens official told Pointblanknews.com.
Upon returning to Nigeria, Adamu, in 2013, founded Beacon Security and Intelligence Limited, which he calls “a Nigerian-owned security risk management and intelligence consulting company.”
According to the former spy, Beacon Security and Intelligence Limited “has been providing bespoke security intelligence, security risk management, and training to a range of clients.”
These clients, according to Beacon Security’s website, include British Council, Malaria Consortium, Frontline AIDS, Adam Smith International, and Concentric Advisors.
Also on the list are Irish-owned construction company PW Nigeria Ltd., UKAid, E-Health Africa, FSS Group, GIZ, and Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management, among other organizations.
Investigations also revealed that Beacon Security and Intelligence Limited renders security consultancy for many super- rich Nigerians and expatriates.
Beacon’s founder, Kabir Adamu has, since insecurity spiked in 2015, been modeled by the Nigerian media as a security expert. Television and radio stations literally fall on themselves to get him on their shows. He has also won several awards on security.
SOLUTION OR PROBLEM?
Recently, however, there have been growing concerns in security circles on the activities and operations of
Beacon Security and Intelligence Limited, and the claim of its founder to being a security expert.
“To begin with, Kabir Adamu spent a large part of his training in the NIA which deals with external or foreign intelligence. The Nigeria Police Force and Department of State Services deal with internal security. It’s only in Nigeria can a dismissed officer of the NIA parade himself as an expert in the internet security challenges of Nigeria,” offered a retired Commissioner of Police.
“Even as a retired COMPOL, it is not all of my colleagues that can claim to be experts on security issues. For instance, an Infantry Colonel in the Army, who, though a trained military officer, is not trained to confront pirates at sea. That is the job of a Navy officer. That is, how it works. Even the DG of NIA cannot handle internal threats in Sokoto or in Anambra, because he’s not trained to do so,” he explained.
“It is sickening to see this retired or dismissed NIA operative talking everyday on television about military and DSS operations around the country. And you guys in the media are egging him on, dressing him in the borrowed robes of a security expert,” lamented the retired police officer, stressing, “this is wrong.”
A senior military intelligence officer disclosed that they had strong reasons to believe that Beacon Security Limited may have been deliberately manipulating security reports to create panic and swell it’s clientele.
He quoted two recent posts by the company on it’s X handle.
The first, posted on Wednesday, read “From threat detection to recovery support, @BeaconNg delivers unmatched pre- & post-incident intel. We forecast risks, guide response, and help after crises. We turn intel into action. Partner with @BeaconNg to stay informed, prepared & secure. Intel that works b4 & after impact.”
On Thursday, @BeaconNg posted this more incendiary message:
“Our communities are bleeding while politics takes center stage. It’s time to prioritize Public Safety Over Politics across Nigeria’s 774 LGAs. Security isn’t a campaign promise It is a human right. We must demand action, not slogans. Safe schools, roads, and farms can’t wait.”
The officer in the counterterrorism unit of the Nigerian police questioned the appropriateness of allowing a dismissed officer of any of the security agencies have a say in the security analysis of the same country.
He said, “if you examine recent reports of Beacon Security on insecurity, you’ll discover that it is not in consonance with the reports we are getting from other security agencies. The figures in Beacon’s reports are usually so inflated- some times as much as four times what is on ground.
“More worrying is that Kabir Usman, who owns Beacon Security, is a key member of Nigeria’s Presidential Priority Data for National Security. This shouldn’t be, more so, as it is obvious that he has a bone to pick with the NIA that dismissed him. Sociologists call this role conflict. Legal experts call it conflict of interest.
“I don’t know how he found his way into such a critical committee. I think that happened under the Buhari administration. There is an urgent need to review the situation in order to avert a situation where one man will control our entire security architecture,” the police officer declared.