Oil Magnate And Founder Of AA & R Investment Group, Abdullahi Bashir-Haske, In Deeper Trouble Over Alleged Fraud Link With NNPCL Boss

<h4>Oil Magnate And Founder Of AA &amp&semi; R Investment Group<&sol;h4>&NewLine;<h4><&sol;h4>&NewLine;<p><strong><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">OpenLife Nigeria<&sol;a><&sol;strong> reports that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission &lpar;EFCC&rpar; has intensified its investigation into Abdullahi Bashir Haske&comma; the founder of AA &amp&semi; R Investment Group&comma; who has been declared wanted for alleged criminal conspiracy and money laundering&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Haske who is said to be a close ally of NNPC Limited Group Chief Executive Officer&comma; Bayo Ojulari&comma; is also linked to the controversial organisation of a lavish NNPCL management retreat in Kigali&comma; Rwanda&comma; where five private jets were allegedly chartered to fly top executives to the luxury event&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The wanted oil magnate was previously detained and had his passport seized by investigators&comma; but sources said that he managed to escape the country using another travel document&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In a public notice signed by EFCC spokesperson Dele Oyewale&comma; the Commission urged anyone with useful information on Haske’s whereabouts to contact its offices nationwide&comma; security agencies&comma; or reach out via its official helplines and email&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The manhunt comes amid wider controversy surrounding alleged fraudulent contracts linked to Haske and the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited &lpar;NNPCL&rpar;&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>According to EFCC sources&comma; over &dollar;56 million has been traced to different accounts linked to Haske within the last three months alone&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>A civic group&comma; the Coalition of Nigerian Patriots for Good Governance&comma; recently accused the NNPCL leadership under Ojulari of awarding a ₦5&period;7 billion consultancy deal to <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;vanguardngr&period;com&sol;">Haske<&sol;a> without due process&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The group described the award as &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;a loot in broad daylight&comma;” questioning why an obscure firm with no verifiable track record was handpicked for such a contract&period; It further condemned what it called reckless spending by NNPCL executives&comma; citing both the controversial Kigali retreat and the secretive consultancy deal&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>At the heart of the EFCC’s deepening probe are suspicions of money laundering&comma; bulk cash transfers&comma; and questionable transactions tied to NNPC EnServe Ltd&period;&comma; a subsidiary of NNPCL’s Upstream Directorate&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>While the Commission continues its search&comma; civil society groups have vowed to sustain pressure&comma; insisting that accountability is owed to Nigerians &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;at a time when over 200 million people live in multidimensional poverty&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;