ABUJA, Nigeria (September 11, 2026) — Former Kogi West Senator Dino Melaye has warned the Federal Government and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) against inviting, arresting, or interrogating African Democratic Congress (ADC) presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar over a corruption petition currently before the commission.

Melaye, a prominent ADC chieftain, issued the warning in a video posted to his X account, describing the petition as frivolous and saying the party would resist any attempt to use it as a basis to target Atiku. “This is our note of warning, if due to this frivolous petitions you invite, arrest, or interview Atiku Abubakar, and we are not saying it with fear or favour, we will prove to you that those in government are less than one percent of the population of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” Melaye said, adding that the ADC would demonstrate that “the people own government.”

The warning follows a petition filed by Ehiozuwa J. Agbonayinma, a former member of the House of Representatives and former Code of Conduct Bureau official, asking the EFCC to reopen and prosecute a financial crimes case tied to a 2006 EFCC report on Atiku’s conduct as vice president. The petition, filed through Sagitarian Law Firm and signed by Principal Counsel Hannibal Egbe Uwaifo, was dated August 27 and received at the EFCC chairman’s office on September 1. It gave the commission a 14-day window to act.

The underlying allegations date back to 2005 and 2006, when the EFCC and an administrative panel investigated Atiku over claims of money laundering, abuse of office, and the diversion of roughly $135 million in Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) money during his time as vice president under Olusegun Obasanjo. The probe contributed to a bitter political rift between the two men. A Lagos State High Court later set aside the EFCC’s administrative indictment in December 2006, ruling it unconstitutional and flawed, and Agbonayinma’s petition alleges that the promised prosecution that was to follow Atiku’s exit from office never materialized.

Atiku has publicly rejected the renewed push. Responding through his senior special assistant on public communication, Phrank Shaibu, he said the allegations had already been scrutinized by the EFCC, an administrative panel, the National Assembly, and the courts, and that no court ever convicted him. “Let us not rewrite history. The Obasanjo administration did not protect me… Yet no court convicted me on these allegations. That is the record,” Atiku said, questioning what new evidence, if any, had emerged in 2026 that was not available twenty years ago.

The renewed petition and Melaye’s warning come as Atiku prepares to contest the January 15, 2027 presidential election as the ADC’s candidate. Sources cited in Nigerian media reports have suggested the EFCC is unlikely to reopen the case given the proximity of the election, though the commission has not issued a public statement on the petition or on Melaye’s warning as of this report.

This is a developing story.