Scrutinising Claims Linking the IGP to an Alleged Fraudster, An Investigator’s Review -By Dahiru Lawal

When I first came across the report alleging that Nigeria’s Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, ordered a digital clean-up to erase traces of a relationship with a suspected international fraudster, my instinct as a fact checker got the better part of me. The story was heavy with insinuation, anonymous sourcing and dramatic language, yet it was also, on the surface, a claim-rich report. That meant it was testable. And in investigative work, anything that can be tested must be tested.

I read the report several times, not to agree or disagree with it, but to strip it down to its factual spine. What exactly was being alleged, and what evidence was offered to support those allegations. Very quickly, it became clear that the story relied on a bundle of claims that derived their power from being presented together. Once those claims were separated and examined individually, many of the questions raised by the report began to collapse under scrutiny.

I started by constructing what investigators call a claim matrix. The report made five central assertions. That the IGP had a personal relationship with a Nigerian socialite accused in an international fraud scheme. That the socialite gave the IGP money and gifts. That the IGP ordered a digital cleanup to erase evidence of this relationship. That he protected the individual from law enforcement scrutiny. And that recent postings and redeployments within the police were part of a cover-up. Each of these claims carried a different evidentiary burden, and each needed to stand on its own.

The first test I applied was what I call the evidence threshold test. For every claim, three questions must be answered before it can be treated as anything more than speculation. What is the primary evidence. Is the source direct or hearsay. And can the claim be independently verified. These are are the backbone of credible investigative journalism.

On the claim of a personal relationship between the IGP and the alleged fraud suspect, the report leaned heavily on unnamed sources and vague references to photographs. Yet no photographs were published. No dates were provided. No locations were identified. No events were named. In cases where photographs are used to establish personal or exclusive relationships, context is everything. Where were the photos taken. At what event. Who else was present. Was it a public function, a ceremonial gathering, or a private meeting. Without this information, the existence of a photograph, even if it exists, proves nothing beyond physical proximity at a point in time. Presence at a public or social event is not evidence of a personal relationship, let alone complicity in criminal conduct. The anonymous sources cited in the report, if they indeed had access to such photographs, would reasonably be expected to provide at least basic contextual proof. None was offered.

The allegation that the socialite gave money and gifts to the IGP is even more serious, because it crosses from insinuation into criminal accusation. Such a claim demands hard proof. Bank transfers. Financial records. An asset trail. Receipts. A petition to the Code of Conduct Bureau. An EFCC filing. A sworn statement from a direct witness. The report provides none of these. It does not cite a single document, financial instrument or on the record testimony to substantiate the claim. In investigative terms, this absence is fatal. When a report accuses a public official of receiving illicit payments but produces no financial trail, no official complaint and no sworn accuser, it fails the most basic credibility test.

The claim that the IGP ordered a digital clean-up also collapses when subjected to technical scrutiny. A serious investigation would ask whether images were actually deleted, when the deletions occurred, who controlled the accounts involved, and whether similar digital hygiene exercises had been carried out previously for other senior officials. It would also check whether cached versions of the alleged images still exist in open source archives, search engine caches, or third party media platforms. In this case, no technical evidence was presented. No screenshots of deleted posts. No metadata. No platform logs. No forensic indicators linking any deletion to a direct instruction from the IGP or connecting it to the fraud allegations. Without such evidence, the claim remains unproven, especially in an era where public officials routinely manage their digital exposure to prevent impersonation and misuse.

Perhaps the most consequential allegation is that the IGP protected the suspect from law enforcement. Protection, however, presupposes the existence of a law enforcement process. Was the individual ever under formal investigation. Was there a petition. Was a case file opened. Was he declared wanted. Was any police directive issued in his favour. The report answers none of these questions. There is no record cited of obstruction, interference or preferential treatment. In investigative work, you cannot claim protection where no underlying process has been shown to exist. The absence of any documented investigation makes the allegation structurally unsound.

The report’s interpretation of routine police postings and redeployments suffers from a similar flaw. It presents internal movements as evidence of a cover up, yet provides no documentary link between those decisions and the allegations at hand. This is speculative analysis, not factual finding. Without internal memos, directives or testimony from decision makers tying those postings to the alleged scandal, such claims remain interpretive rather than evidentiary.

A recurring problem throughout the report is its exclusive reliance on anonymous sources. Anonymity can be justified in investigative journalism, but it does not lower the burden of proof. In this case, every major allegation rests on unnamed voices. No documents are published. No recordings are provided. No sworn statements are cited. The reader is repeatedly asked to accept “I was told” in place of “I saw,” and hearsay in place of direct knowledge. That is not verification. It is narration.

What is most striking, after reviewing the report in full, is not what it contains but what it lacks. There is no police petition. No financial trail. No official investigation against the IGP. No court filings. No asset declaration anomalies. No on the record accusers willing to attach their names and evidence to their claims. In investigative journalism, missing evidence is not a minor flaw. It is an indictment of the work itself.

After testing each claim against basic evidentiary standards, most of them fall into two categories. Unsubstantiated or unproven. That does not mean questions should not be asked. It means that the questions, as presented, have not been answered with facts. Allegations of this magnitude demand more than inference and anonymous assertion. They demand proof.

As a fact checker and OSINT investigator, I am trained to follow evidence, not emotion. In this case, the evidence trail runs thin very quickly. Until documents, financial records, verifiable photographs, or direct witnesses are produced, the burden of proof remains firmly on those making the accusations. Journalism does not end at suspicion. It begins with verification.