The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) Director-General, Yusha’u Ahmed, claimed that Peter Mbah, the state’s incoming governor, did not present an authentic NYSC certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has refuted this claim.

The PDP accused the NYSC DG of lying against the governor-elect.

The NYSC DG had insisted that Mbah’s certificate, which he had given to INEC to enable him to run for governor in 2023, was not one that had been issued by the organisation.

On Friday, May 19, Ahmed made this statement while participating in “The Morning Show,” a magazine programme on Arise News Television.

“You can’t go and collect certificates on the street. You can’t go and collect the certificate in your room. You can’t go collect the certificate at that hotel. You should know better. Please, I don’t want to talk much about thgovernorGovernor-elect is a lawyer. I am not a lawyer, but I know that as the DG NYSC, I’m fully aware of this case,” he said.

“He came to me, I; told my Director of Administration, ‘let me see your certificate’. I was so frank and clear to him that the certificate is not from us. I showed him some few examples just to help him. But he chose to go to court and even to sue whoever that he’s suing. 

“As far as I’m concerned, NYSC has not been sued. I’m yet to see anything from the court. All that people are saying is what I’m hearing. I’ve not received any court order. We don’t tolerate anything certificate racketeering.”

Meanwhile, addressing journalists in Enugu, the spokesperson of the Enugu State PDP Campaign Council, Nana Ogbodo, challenged the NYSC DG “to produce any other certificate in the series of Mbah’s certificate that has the same serial number as his”.

Ogbodo said: “The DG lied when he claimed that he told Mbah during a meeting in his office that the NYSC did not issue his certificate. The truth is that he told Mbah that the director in question neither briefed nor cleared with him before issuing the letter dated February 1, 2023 disclaiming Dr. Mbah’s discharge certificate.”

“He equally expressed surprise when Mbah showed him the letter by the NYSC national headquarters dated 7th May 2003 (reference number NYSC/DHQ/CM/27/20) to the State Director, Lagos, NYSC, re-mobilising him for the remaining part of his service year after a break, by the express and written permission of the agency, to complete BarPart II (Bar Final).

“Excerpt from the re-mobilisation letter states: ‘I am directed to refer to your letter of 24th April, Reference No. LA/01/1532/T on the above subject matter and to request you to re-instate the corps member to continue his service year from where he stopped, with effect from May 2003’.

“It is noteworthy that the directors and staff present at the meeting did not deny that the NYSC authored the letter re-mobilising Mbah, while his place of primary assignment, Udeh & Associates, Lagos, has not denied that it authored the letter reabsorbing him to complete the remaining months of his service year as well as the final clearance letter to enable him receive his NYSC discharge certificate at the end of his service.

“The DG actually told Dr. Mbah that he was barely three months in office at the time, but would resolve the matter with dispatch. But it is striking that the NYSC is yet to formally respond to Mbah’s petition since February 2, 2023. Instead, the NYSC, through its Director of Corps Certification, has continued to issue letters of disclaimer to various political interests in Enugu State, in clear contempt of a subsisting court judgment upholding the authenticity of his certificate and in relentless disparagement of his reputation.”

He claims that the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company PLC prints NYSC discharge certificates with security features like watermarks and batch-specific serial numbers.

However, ThisDay newspaper reported on February 7 that a group claimed Mbah had falsified his NYSC certificate. 

Following that, Mbah’s disqualification from the governorship election was demanded by the coalition Total Support for Rule of Law and Justice Initiative and Enugu Progressive Forum.