EFCC Confirms Questioning Former FIRS Chairman, Babatunde Fowler

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on Monday confirmed questioning Mr Babatunde Fowler, former Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).

The invitation of Fowler was confirmed in an SMS to newsmen on Monday by Mr Wilson Uwujaren, EFCC spokesman.

“He was invited by the Commission and responded today,” he wrote.

When asked for details of the investigation, he told journalists they were not yet available.

Naija News gathered that Fowler was interrogated by the commission over N100 billion tax evasion allegations levelled against a tax firm, Alpha Beta Consulting.

Fowler is a former Chief Executive Officer, Lagos State Internal Revenue Service.

Recall that the former Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Alpha Beta Consulting, Dapo Apara, accused the firm of tax fraud to the tune of N100bn.

In a petition to the EFCC in 2018, Apara stated that Alpha Beta, the firm given exclusive rights to monitor and collect Internally Generated Revenue on behalf of the Lagos Government, “has become an avenue for official corruption of government officials, a conduit pipe for massive money-laundering scheme, tax evasion, among other vices.”

In the petition which was written by his lawyer, Adetunji Shoyoye and Associates, the ex-CEO claimed that the fraud had been covered by powerful politicians in the state.

President Muhammadu Buhari had replaced Fowler as FIRS chairman in December 2019 at the end of his first term in office.