On January 20, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) announced it was electronically auctioning some vehicles it had recovered from crimes and secured their forfeiture.

It said the exercise followed its 2004 Act, the Public Procurement Act of 2007 and the Proceeds of Crime Act of 2022, and that it was only open to the public. This exercise was not open to EFCC staff or those who forfeited the vehicles.

“EFCC through its appointed auctioneers will conduct e-Auction of the under-listed vehicles that are subject to final forfeiture orders under the EFCC (Establishment) Act, 2004, Public Procurement Act, 2007 and the Proceeds of Crime (Recovery & Management) Act, 2022,” the statement reads in part.

The auction was held on Monday through appointed auctioneers. However, Nigerians on X have since complained about the lack of transparency in the auction and its processes. They claimed the EFCC’s vehicle auction was deceptive in some cases.

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FIJ spoke with four bidders who emphasised the lack of transparency in the process, saying they didn’t know any Nigerian who had successfully bought a vehicle from the exercise either.

CONGRATS, YOU WON. ERM… SORRY, YOU DIDN’T

One of the bidders, who didn’t want his name in print, told FIJ he won a bid but as soon as he did, the auctioning company sent an email saying his win had been cancelled as it was invalid.

This bidder told FIJ he had been targeting scraps when he placed a N50,000 bid on an old vehicle.

“I tried bidding on all the auction sites for Lagos — about five sites or so. I paid more attention to Fagobe, USBau and Kili while targeting unserviceable and scrap vehicles,” he told FIJ on Wednesday.

“I noticed that all the sites had a starting bid ranging from N100,000 to N500,000, except for Kili, which had a starting bid of N1.00 but it was basically an error.

“Since I was targeting scrap vehicles, I noticed an old vehicle and placed a bid of N50,000. As soon as the auction closed at 4 pm, I received a message stating that I had won the bid for a Honda Legend.

“Funnily enough, I informed family members and friends, but they said it wasn’t possible, insisting that good things like this don’t happen in Nigeria.

“Unfortunately, the story changed. I was later informed that I didn’t actually win because my offer was below the starting bid amount.

“I was sent two emails confirming that I had won before receiving another email stating that I no longer had.”

OUTRAGEOUSLY HIGH WINNING BIDS

Austin Dakor, another bidder, told FIJ on Thursday that before Monday, there was time to view the assets and make a decision. “All was well during the bids viewing. The sites were up and available,” he told FIJ.

He said the moment the bidding exercise kicked off, web connection to the sites started to fluctuate and some of them were completely inaccessible until a few minutes before the end of the auction.

Dakor said he was interested in two vehicles put up for auction; Lexus RX350 models (2009 and 2013). He was not given the opportunity to make a bid and potentially claim those vehicles.

“The bidding was meant to last from 11 am to 4 pm on the said day, but when the exercise started, the sites began to fluctuate,” Dakor told FIJ.

“Some of them were coming on and off, while some like Areogun Resources Nigeria Ltd were down till about 10 or 20 minutes to the end of the bids.”

Dakor managed to make separate bids only to find the winning bids suspiciously high. He always came second.

“Also, I had two bids that I was second for. Actually, the winning bids were outrageous. I can’t imagine someone paying N240 million and N9 billion,” Dakor explained.

MALFUNCTIONING BIDDING WEBSITES

Another bidder, who simply wishes to identify as Baron, confirmed Dakor’s comment on the outrageous bid to FIJ on Wednesday. He, too, observed that there were lots of outrageous bids on the auctioning websites which ran into billions of naira.

He said he believed this was to prevent genuine bids from interested parties.

“On some other websites, outrageous bids running into billions of naira were placed by bidders on some vehicles. This is a well-orchestrated attempt to gate-keep genuine bids from interested bidders,” Baron told FIJ.

He said that the websites also malfunctioned in a way that shut him and other prospective bidders out.

“I observed that on most of the websites that I visited for the auction, especially websites covering Lagos, Ibadan and Ilorin regions, the bids were left open while one or two websites were closed,” he said.

“At about 3:45 pm on Monday, most of the websites began to malfunction. Eventually, at about 3:50 pm, the websites crashed, thus, keeping out bidders in the last-minute rush to close out bids.

“I strongly believe this is a calculated move to disenfranchise genuine bidders from the process by the incompetent auctioneers engaged by the EFCC.”

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‘THE WEBSITE CRASHED WITH 2 MINS TO GO’

Ekundayo, another bidder who spoke with FIJ said he was leading on a particular bid but, a few minutes towards the end of the exercise, he decided to add more money but the website crashed and he couldn’t reenter the web page.

“The bidding was going smoothly, and I was leading on a Toyota Camry and a Honda Accord. But with just two minutes and one second left, I tried to increase my bid, only for the website to crash completely,” Ekundayo told FIJ.

When FIJ asked the bidders if they knew a single person who was able to successfully bid for a vehicle, they all responded in the negative.

When FIJ called Dele Oyewale, the spokesperson of the agency on Thursday, he said he had issued a statement on the matter.

In the statement, published on the EFCC’s X page on Thursday, he said that the commission could confirm that there were glitches throughout the auctioning process.

Oyewale made a guess that the process was hindered by an unstable internet connection and the number of Nigerians willing to bid. However, this could not be proven.

“Relevant Departments of the Commission monitored the exercise and can confirm that there were glitches. This observation was communicated to the auctioneers for remedial action,” the statement reads in part.

“Without making excuses for the auctioneers, it is possible that the sheer number of participants in the exercise (over four million) perhaps stretched the carrying capacity of the online facilities of the auctioneers, while unstable internet service in parts of the country exacerbated the challenge.

“The Commission is currently awaiting the report of the auctioneers and assures that genuine complaints by members of the public will be reviewed to ensure that no one is short-changed in the exercise. Those who follow through the process without glitches and emerge winners will certainly be allocated their vehicles.”