Committee Uncovers Over 500 Cocoa Farmlands Illegally Annexed 

Ekanem ASUQUO

A monumental fraud amounting to several millions of naira perpetuated by the embattled Cocoa Allocation Committee overseeing the running of Cross River state government cocoa estates spanning from Governor Ben Ayade's era has been uncovered.

The plot was uncovered by the State Assets and Management Committee currently verifying the activities of the Cocoa Management and Recovery Committee at the instance of Governor Bassey Otu. 

Recall that after mounting outcries by stakeholders and landlord communities triggered by the nefarious activities of the Cocoa Allocation Committee, the state government had mandated the Assets Management and Recovery Committee headed by  Bar. Gilbert Agbor to investigate, recover illegally acquired cocoa farmlands, reallocate and recommend appropriate measures to forestall future reoccurrence.

Findings by THE BEAGLE NEWS revealed that the plots was allegedly hatched in two prongs by members of the Cocoa Allocation Committee headed and their cohorts and converted over 10 of cocoa farmlands. 

Even the cocoa allocation committee set up by Otu also derailed in their duties as the members were accused of diverting some plots of farm land belonging to government. 

According to the leader of the investigating team and the Special Adviser to Governor Bassey Otu on Assets Recovery, Gilbert Agbor," the furor generated clandestine activities of the cocoa committee prompted the governor to get ordered a full scale investigation to deescalate tension and get to the root cause of the issue

"Our task entails unveiling (if any) any action is undertaken by the committee outside their schedule, any action amounting to diversion government revenues or shortchanging the state and arresting the escalating tension which had engulfed the cocoa sector thereby threatening a major source of income for the state.

"Our findings are shocking. After combing through the four major cocoa estates namely Ikom cocoa estate, Abia, Benegehe estate, Abon-Takon cocoa estate, and the Cross River Forest/Cocoa project, we were shocked by the level of sharp practices allegedly perpetrated by the Cocoa committee members."

Agbor revealed that" So many farmlands were under-declared in government records. What this means is that on paper you had five farmlands allocated to a person, but on the ground, the actual size is 10 farmlands.

 Apart from that, the committee members allocated several hectares of farmlands to themselves. 

 "We also discovered that most of the allottees were issued with fake bank tellers apparently after being deceived into paying money into private accounts rather than designated government accounts. The Inland Revenue Service had to offer technical support to enable us to detect such forged tellers.

 He concluded "So far, we have recovered over 500 farmlands which we are going to allocate to interested persons in line with due process"

Stakeholders in the sector, who spoke to THE BEAGLE NEWS said the large size of the Cocoa Allocation Committee comprising 16 members was responsible for the massive fraudulent activities that engulfed the cocoa estates since each member had annexed almost ten plots each for personal use before any other consideration.