Peter Mbah Certificate Saga: DSS indicts NYSC of cover-up, poor record-keeping

• clears Mbah of certificate forgery

The Department of State Services (DSS) has debunked claims by the National Youths Service Corps (NYSC) that the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2023 general election and incumbent governor of the state, Dr Peter Mbah, forged his NYSC discharge certificate.

DSS accused NYSC of shoddy and hasty investigation in concluding that Mbah’s NYSC discharge certificate was fake, saying that certificates in Mbah’s series were found to have been issued to corps members in Lagos, contrary to NYSC’s claim.

It frowned at the NYSC’s misplacement of Mbah’s original file and opened a temporary one for him, noting that NYSC was also unable to trace to whom or which state or states of the federation 12 of its certificates, A808297 to A808308 were issued.

The security agency said “the failure of the NYSC to maintain a proper record-keeping system was the cause of its inability to trace Peter Ndubuisi Mbah’s initial certificate”, adding “It would be wrong for the NYSC to blame Peter Ndubuisi Mbah for its own failure in record keeping”.

The DSS made these known in a Statement on Oath adopted by its representative, Mr Yahaya Isa Mohammed, at the ongoing Enugu State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal as Mbah called two witnesses to open his defence on Wednesday.

Giving evidence, the subpoenaed DSS Deputy Director, Operations and Strategic Department, said the security agency commenced an investigation into the discharge certificate controversy following a petition to it by Dr Mbah dated February 8, 2023.

Mohammed said the investigation revealed: “There were exchanges of correspondences between Mbah and the NYSC at every stage of their interactions. Mbah did not take any action without the NYSC’s approval.

“That Mbah’s file with the NYSC got missing at some point in time and NYSC started using a temporary file for him. For instance, in NYSC’s response to his application for deferment, the file number was LA/10/1532, while in their response to his remobilization application, the file number was LA/01/1532/T.

He added: “There was a mix-up in his record as a result of the missing file.

“That the difference in Mbah’s certificate number compared to others that were mobilized at the same time, is due to the inability of NYSC to trace the initial file where the first certificate A678 was.

According to him, “from the documents presented by NYSC regarding certificate numbers, about twelve (12) certificate numbers (A808297-A808308) which include that of Mbah, remained unaccounted for in the eight (8) series by the NYSC.

Mohammed further stated, “That the law firm, Udeh &Associates, where Mbah served, cleared him for his monthly clearance for eleven (11) months covering January-June, 2002 and May-August, 2003 as well as his final clearance in September 2003, covering the period of his first mobilization and re-instatement indicated that he served; hence, no need for him to forge certificate.

-Nigerian Tribune