It emerged at the weekend that the National Assembly (NASS) management administered an oath of secrecy on its workers because of the allegation that Lagos lawyer, Festus Keyamo, presented forged bank documents to the panel which probed the N2.3 billion car scandal in the House of Representatives.
Keyamo may be prosecuted for forgery and perjury if the House accepts the report of its Ethics and Privileges Committee this week.
The report, which absolved the House leadership of blame, said the letter Keyamo wrote to Speaker Dimeji Bankole was in bad faith as "(he) did not seek to authenticate the document relied upon" and "the origin of the document which formed the annexure to (his) petition is seriously questionable."
The Committee recommended that "having found that Keyamo’s letter is faulty and baseless in its allegations, the House (should) prevail on the Inspector General of Police, (Mike Okiro), and/or other relevant security agencies to investigate how the annexure/documents attached to Keyamo’s letter were obtained."
The recommendations were based on the allegation that Keyamo forged the 2006 price list of Peugeot Automobile of Nigeria (PAN), which he used to justify discrepancies in the prices of the cars.
Besides, he may have a case to answer over payment vouchers he presented that allegedly contained discrepancies and did not have Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) cheque numbers.
He had claimed in his testimony to the Committee that a Zenith Bank cheque was used in the payment for the cars, a claim denied by the bank and the NASS management.
Keyamo swore on oath before the Committee that the documents he presented were authentic.
But it was learnt that Keyamo’s involvement may put the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in a quandary in its own investigation as he is an EFCC counsel in other cases.
However, Keyamo insisted on Sunday that only a court of law can declare a document forged, insisting that the lawmakers should be prosecuted by the EFCC.
Said he: "They are comedians, they are very unserious fellows. The matter is subject to criminal investigation and it is the members of the House of Representatives who should be investigated for forgery because they are trying to upturn the document.
"They are the ones the EFCC should investigate. I repeat, they are comedians and unserious fellows.
"It is the most wishy washy investigation I have ever seen; they have no power to investigate crime.
"It is only a court of law that can declare a document forged.
"Was I the one under probe, were they empowered to probe me? I was only a witness before them, now they turned around against their witness.
"Secondly, was I the originator of the story? The story had already originated, I only followed up by asking for explanation?
"So, they lack logic in their reasoning; and when I appeared before them, they abused me and threatened to beat me up.
"Absolutely, they have no moral right to make any recommendation against me because they were not empanelled at all to probe me. I was not under probe, and I was not a witness under oath. They are comedians; they are Papa Ajasco and Company."
The Ethics Committee is chaired by Saleh Minjibir (ANPP, Kano), whose Deputy, John Kalipa (PDP, Rivers), said the investigation absolved Bankole of wrongdoing, as well as NASS Clerk, Nasir Arab.
Kalipa maintained that Keyamo presented forged documents, that none of his allegations could be substantiated, which prompted Arab to administer last month an oath of secrecy on those in possession of NASS vital documents.
Keyamo had argued last Friday that the House leadership has concluded plans to save its face.
He alleged that "at a meeting held on February 11 in the office of a Principal Officer of the House and the leadership agreed that they would launch a frontal attack on the credibility of the EFCC investigation by alleging that the EFCC is merely fabricating its investigation to suit some interests and satisfy certain persons.
"This was decided upon after the leadership of the House made several attempts to compromise the officials of the EFCC over the ongoing investigation but were rebuffed.
"So they decided that they will consider the report of the Ethics and Privileges Committee which is nothing but a movie script written by the leadership of the House.
"The plan is to compromise majority of the House members to adopt the report by railroading the report through the House ahead of the conclusion of investigation by the EFCC so as to water down the impact of the report. A huge amount of money has been set aside for this purpose.
"(But) no matter how hard they try to hide the truth, it will eventually bubble forth. I am also confident that majority of the House members are mature enough to see through these machinations.
"It is now left for them to either sully their collective image with that of some greedy few or to insulate the matter from politics and deal with it as objectively as possible."