The Navy Headquarters under embattled Vice Admiral Emmanuel Ogalla says “unpatriotic” Nigerians exposed details of the naval chief’s alleged oil bunkering and contract splitting fraud.

Peoples Gazette reported on Friday that news of Mr Ogalla’s clandestine activities within seven months of his appointment had reached the office of the minister of state for defence, Bello Matawalle.

In a statement released on Saturday, signed by AO Ayo Vaughan, navy director of information, the service denied that Mr Ogalla perpetuated a scheme that coordinated oil bunkering under the protection of naval personnel. It also denied that Mr Ogalla had been involved in the contract splitting fraud.

The statement also denied that Mr Ogalla accepted bribes totalling over $170 million over the past six months.

“The allegations that the Chief of the Naval Staff (CNS) accepted over $170 million in bribes as well as alleged involvement in multi-billion naira contract splitting fraud in the last six months are untenable, baseless and untrue,” the statement read.

But Mr Mattawale had earlier said the federal government takes the allegations seriously and will investigate, confirming claims of the Gazette that the tops of the chain in the defence ministry had been intimated with the facts of the matter.

The Gazette had reviewed multiple multimedia files, logs and documents to ascertain the veracity of the claims and also obtained clarifications from top military sources on the claims.

When approached for comments and clarification, Mr Ogalla had initially said he would address the issues after a meeting, but he failed to do so. For two days, he evaded subsequent attempts to reach him.