ABUJA: The self-proclaimed Director-General of the controversial Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), Prince Adeyemi Matthew Adeniyi, has revealed how the non-existent agency allegedly found its way into the Federal Government’s 2026 budget despite his arrest before the appropriation process was concluded.
Speaking in a video interview with social media influencer Martins Vincent Otse, popularly known as VeryDarkMan (VDM), shortly after his arrest, Adeniyi insisted that President Bola Tinubu’s Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila, played no role in the agency’s N1.3 billion budgetary allocation.
Instead, he claimed he personally lobbied officials at the Budget Office to secure the agency’s inclusion.
According to Adeniyi, he first approached the Budget Office in December 2024 to have the proposed agency captured in the 2025 Appropriation Bill. However, officials informed him that the budget process had already closed and advised him that the proposal would instead be considered for the 2026 fiscal year.
I went to the Budget Office for the 2025 budget. I submitted my documents, but they told me it was already too late. When the 2025 budget came out and I didn’t see it, they said it would now be for the 2026 budget, he said.
Adeniyi alleged that a female official facilitated his access to the office of the Director-General of the Budget Office before directing him to another senior official handling budget proposals.
He claimed the officials assured him they would explore ways of including the agency in the 2026 budget after it failed to make the 2025 appropriation.
Although he admitted promising future employment opportunities to some officials if the agency eventually took off, Adeniyi denied paying bribes. Honestly, I didn’t pay anybody. The only thing I promised was that if I started employing people, I could help them with jobs,” he stated.
Adeniyi said his arrest abruptly halted every effort relating to the proposed agency.
According to him, he was shocked to later discover that the PFIPC had eventually appeared in the approved 2026 budget despite no longer pursuing the matter.
Immediately there was a problem, everything stopped. I didn’t even know until they said it was inside the budget. I was already facing court matters,” he explained.
When asked whether officials may have inserted the agency into the budget after his arrest, he maintained that he had no knowledge of how it eventually happened.
Addressing allegations that he paid N400 million to facilitate his appointment, Adeniyi claimed the money was delivered in United States dollars through his late associate, Dolapo Tanimola.
However, he admitted he could not confirm whether the money ever reached the President’s Chief of Staff.
He further insisted that he had never met Femi Gbajabiamila physically, either before or after the alleged appointment. I never met Gbajabiamila physically before or after I was appointed. Dolapo Tanimola handled everything for me,” Adeniyi said.
The PFIPC controversy has attracted nationwide attention after authorities declared the organization non-existent and launched investigations into how it allegedly secured a N1.3 billion allocation in the 2026 federal budget.
The latest revelations are expected to intensify ongoing investigations into the circumstances surrounding the attempted establishment of the agency and the processes that led to its appearance in the national appropriation.
