Atiku Raises the Alarm over N6.44bn World Cup Budget Mystery, Seeks Neutral Probe

Chuks Okocha in Abuja

Presidential candidate of African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, has raised the alarm over an alleged allocation of N6.44 billion for the 2026 World Cup, which Nigeria did not qualify for and was not participating in.

Atiku also said there was a sinister plot by the President Bola Tinubu administration to manipulate the narrative surrounding the controversial Presidential Foreign Investment Promotion Council (PFIPC) scandal, shield government officials from scrutiny, and redirect blame towards the political opposition.

In a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, “Atiku specifically drew attention to the allocation of N6.44 billion for a ‘Special Presidential Support Group for the 2026 World Cup Qualifiers’, despite Nigeria having already been eliminated from the qualification process in November 2025—about one month before the 2026 budget was presented to and considered by the National Assembly.”

The former vice president questioned, “How does a serious government budget N6.44 billion for presidential support for World Cup qualifiers after the country had already been eliminated?

“What competition was the money intended to support? Who inserted the provision, who approved it and who was expected to benefit from an expenditure whose stated purpose had already ceased to exist?”

Linking the development to the phantom Presidential Foreign Investment Promotion Council (PFIPC) scandal, Atiku described the recent arrest of the self-styled Director-General of the PFIPC, Adeniyi Adeyemi, as a calculated move to extract statements that could be deployed to implicate opposition figures rather than uncover the full truth behind the scandal.

Atiku said the PFIPC controversy could not be reduced to the alleged actions of Adeyemi alone.

According to him, “The weightier scandal is how an organisation that the presidency now claims was fictitious or non-existent allegedly penetrated the highest levels of government, obtained diplomatic recognition and accreditation, recruited more than 300 personnel, secured office accommodation at the National Secretariat, and reportedly received budgetary allocations, including an alleged N1.3 billion provision in the 2026 Appropriation Act.”

He maintained that such extensive operations could not have occurred without either active official collaboration or a catastrophic breakdown of oversight across multiple government institutions.

He stated, “The scandal is not merely that one man allegedly impersonated public authority. The greater scandal is that the Tinubu administration allegedly opened the doors of the Nigerian state to him, allowed him to acquire the appearance and privileges of official legitimacy and permitted him to interact with institutions and diplomatic interests in the name of the federal government.”

Atiku added that the PFIPC controversy must also be viewed against the wider background of what he described as mind-boggling profligacy and questionable appropriations embedded in the 2026 federal budget.

He described the allocation as not merely an example of poor judgment but also a damning indictment of the integrity of the budgeting process. He said it reinforced public suspicion that the national budget had become a warehouse for dubious expenditure, fiscal waste, and allocations without any defensible public purpose.

Atiku stressed that those were allegations requiring independent, transparent, and impartial investigation.

He said the PFIPC scandal had become a major embarrassment to Nigeria’s international reputation and warned that it must not be swept under the carpet, like several other unresolved controversies, including the Humanitarian Affairs Ministry scandal, questions surrounding refinery rehabilitation expenditure, and various disputed budgetary allocations.

He stated, “The Tinubu administration has a peculiar proclivity for propaganda, and we are reliably informed that there are plans to twist the facts of the PFIPC scandal, absolve those within the government who ought to answer questions and manufacture a politically convenient story against the opposition.”