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EFCC’S UNFINISHED BUSINESSS.
By Peter Claver Oparah.
I am not excited that, at long last, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has docked some former governors that dipped their hands into their states’ trough. I don’t even fancy the chances of the EFCC to pull these cases through despite the hyperbole that has been brought to bear on them. I have my reservations for the capacity of the EFCC to go the whole hog and not resort to plea bargain that would let the sinner off the hook, with a larger chunk of his loot left untouched, after agreeing to refund a little part of the heist. I doubt the staying power of EFCC, not because it is incapable of a better show but because it has been so tainted by politics that it can hardly operate as an independent body. Truth is that the EFCC, as presently constituted, is still tainted with brazen partisan that only a deliberate action can restore the confidence of the people on its works. The other limiting tendency is that the EFCC is so much in love with the klieglights that it finds wishy-washy publicity so irresistible in the course of its works. Not for Nuhu Ribadu’s EFCC is the ability to work several meters away from the public glare and not for it is the meticulous assemblage of killing evidence that would have ensured it scores for every task it deigns to take to the courts. Before now, the EFCC has grown so paranoid of the courts that it had branded the judiciary as corrupt just because the judiciary refused to buy into its pedestrian and highly political approach to fighting official graft. But such suicidal lethargy to judicial due process merely underscores the fact that the EFCC by the way it elected to fight corruption, was clearing the coast for the most corrupt genre of Nigerian politicians to continue their Byzantine rule over other Nigerians. This was put beyond doubt by the manner it worked tirelessly towards the delivery of the most corrupt electoral exercise in the history of mankind last April as well as the deft manner it has risen to defend the most corrupt crust of the country’s politicians, domiciled in the PDP as questions of their scruples arose.
Make no mistake about it; corruption remains the most debilitating factor standing between Nigeria and progress. It remains a decrementing tendency that has afflicted the Nigerian state since independence. Again, there is no doubt that Nigerians, especially the downtrodden abhor corruption, for the corrosive effect it inflicts on them. If the opinions of Nigerians are sampled today, the popular will of the people would be that Nigeria needs the Jerry Rawlings treatise in dealing with its thieving political class who have made life a living nightmare for them, while growing robust from the commonwealth. So there is little doubt that an average Nigerian abhors corruption with a heightened passion. Perhaps, the big question that has been galling Ribadu’s mind is why Nigerians abhor what he fancies himself as doing in EFCC, with the huge theatrics and publicity he brings to bear on his task. In finding answers to this puzzle, Ribadu needs to revisit the role he played in the process that led to the shameful macabre charade called the 2007 general elections. He needs to revisit the endless rigmarole and shameless volt face he indulged in as the widespread indiscretions of former president Obasanjo and his curtsying fawners unraveled and emitted so much putrid stench all over the polity. Even as Ribadu professed his desire to give corruption a bloody nose, he is yet to explain why he publicly readily mounts public shows of the cleanliness of Obasanjo and his courtiers when incontrovertible evidences point to their gross violation of the basic anti-corruption ethics.
But then, it is not too late for Ribadu and his EFCC to chart a clean course and redeem what remains of their image, battered so terribly by his unbridled partisanship as the prelude to the electoral heist of April unraveled. I don’t fancy he had started by arraigning some governors that were mere fringe players in the gargantuan corruption binge that spawned May 1999 to May 2007. For now, the big players have been left free to infect the entire polity with their nuisance effect. The realization that corruption is not a theatrical piece that depends on the erratic mindset of those in power will tremendously assist Ribadu to acknowledge that his has been a warped definition that has rather diverted attention from the real hefty plunderers while hunting the petty thieves. In a dispensation where a person that was primed for the presidency on the mantra of being the only clean governor in town, has, after so much fumigation, declared an asset base that is just some few millions shy of a billion Naira, from just governing an arid state as Katsina, should convince anybody that professes to fight corruption that there is fire on the mountain. It is also strengthened by the fact that Governor Gbenga Daniel has come forward with the magic of making over N4 billion Naira, not from governing Ogun State but from Kresta Laurel while his wife made hundreds of millions of Naira from doing God-knows-what. These confirm the contention that the eight years Obasanjo was playacting about fighting corruption remains an unprecedented boom period for corruption and it is so predominant that nothing practically works in Nigeria today. To help EFCC outlive the self-created poor image it cultivated among Nigerians especially in the later parts of the Obasanjo pestilence and having realized that it cannot mutilate Nigerians perception of corruption, Ribadu and co should brace up and deal with the following sore cases that gnaw at the soul of EFCC’s poor image with millions of Nigerians.
Firstly, EFCC must close in on former president Obasanjo and clear the mountain loads of indiscretions that trail him. Questions about his sudden wealth, from bankruptcy in 1998, the presidential library, the MOFAS account, the Bells School, the PTDF looting, Transcorp wonder company, the Otta Farm renaissance, the dubious sale of the country’s patrimony to fronts, hirelings and cronies, the cash in presidential jet scandal, and so many other putrid evidence of official looting by the former president. EFCC would find that it would eternally work to its detriment for it to continue shielding the former president from the law when the entire nation is alive to the obscene display of wealth by the former president. I hope he is not still enjoying immunity, given the way he is deliberately left out of the prospective politicians EFCC wants to rein in. The way it had carried on as if corruption is limited to the acts of the former governors, without referring to the source and headspring of corruption in the last eight years, induces greater questions about the capability of Nuhu Ribadu to cleanse the country of filth perpetrated by politicians.
Secondly, the EFCC must, as a matter of urgency, launch into a comprehensive probe of the present Maurice Iwu-led INEC. Nigerians are aware of the hefty sums of monies voted for electoral projects that were never executed. Being that INEC has been the source of the present tempestuous drift of the nation and given that the over N60 billion that was emptied in INEC were mostly monies by western donor agencies, the EFCC would do greater harm to itself if it pretends it never knew the collateral damage the wholesome fraud and corruption perpetrated in INEC just the other day does to its image and that of the country. If Iwu is chained and brought to court, that will certainly send a great signal that EFCC is up and doing on the task of ensuring that this country is not being deliberately exposed to the blistering effect of fraudsters and scammers that deign no scruples, inflicting deliberate damage to the country and profiting greatly from such asinine business. The cost of leaving out Iwu from trial is that he would continue his present pastime of insulting the whole human race for not accepting that he should dupe the country of several billions of Naira and forge electoral results as they suit the whims of those that hired him. Do we need to revisit Colin Powel’s nation of scammers comment? Then EFCC must rein in Iwu before he rubbishes what remains of the image of the country.
Thirdly, the EFCC must arrest Bode George and bring him to justice for the N82 billion scam at the NPA. One realizes that in a bid to explain away his alleged partisan approach to fighting corruption, Ribadu was to engage in a shocking trading of very contradictory and embarrassing riposte to his earlier indictment of George, when he rehearsed the tame and tepid excuse being tendered by Bode George over the NPA loot to the effect that he (George) was a part-time chairman of NPA, when the plunder took place, as if there are also full-time chairmen of parastatals. By now, Ribadu must have acknowledged that such faux pas that smack of dubiety is not doing his image and that of his EFCC any good and the earlier he brings George to justice, the better for him. Then again, the Emmanuel Andy Uba money laundering charge is a litmus test for EFCC’s fresh commitment to tackle corruption without putting on partisan binoculars. Given that the case happened in the United States and is well known, continued defence of such international crime, as Ribadu tried to do when Uba was being corruptly cleared for his ill-fated gubernatorial dream will only mean some giant flies in EFCC’s ointment of rediscovery.
The well known scandalous handing over of the nation’s refineries to cronies and fronts of Obasanjo must be fully probed. The manner the refineries were handed off in deals that rock the underbelly of decency and due process is a subject of wide-ranging discontent in the polity. I read where Ribadu was, in the hangover of the subservient role he played for Obasanjo, justifying the corrupt sale of the nation’s refineries, which lends some doubt to his capacity to probe the deals. But he must know that so long as he exhibits such brazen fling of pandering to Obasanjo’s narrow and selfish interests, he stands to perpetually injure himself and his image among Nigerians. Related to this is the brazen manner all the known national assets were looted by Obasanjo, his business fronts and his hirelings. These must be probed, the assets recovered and the offenders punished for Nigerians to believe they have an impartial Daniel on the anti-corruption throne of the country. The underhand sale of Apo Legislative Quarters, buildings around Aso Rock and several public buildings all over the federation to cronies of Obasanjo are gaping sores that need be mended for EFCC to regain its damaged image.
Ribadu will soon find out he cannot run away from dodging the question about the funding of the obnoxious third tern project. As the revelations spew of how that deadly agenda was prosecuted under Ribadu’s nose, he stands eternally periled if his EFCC does not burst into the devilish secrecy of the funding of that dubious plot that nudged Nigeria to the precipice as it happened.
Much has been said of the activities of the governors between 1999 and 2007 but nothing is being said of the presidency, which appropriated over 52 per cent of the monthly allocations with practically nothing to show for these. It is a known fact that the federal ministries were racketeering havens during the eight years of Obasanjo rule and the World Bank was to confirm this when it said that over 85 per cent of the nation’s corruption index happens at the presidency. Most of the ministries received far higher allocations than the states but no mention is being made of the ministers and directors and even the shop floor workers in the ministries in the fight against corruption, as if monies allocated for the ministries were free funds at the behest of the presidential appointees. If EFCC cannot inquire why several trillions were poured in on our roads to make them impassable death traps, while several trillions were poured on PHCN to ensure a progressive drop in power output, why several trillions were poured into the refineries to prepare them for free handover to Obasanjo cronies and why trillions were appropriated by federal ministries to render no known service, then it must close shop and leave Nigerians to continue hanging on the hope that someday, somewhere, a pharaoh that knows no Joseph will arise to deal with official graft in a decisive way that will meet the expectations of all Nigerians. If the EFCC cannot muster the will and independence of mind to probe the funding of the PDP, the scammers ring that run NNPC, the PPPRA, the PHCN, the NPA, and other essential and money yielding parastatals, then it should free the governors in its lair. If the EFCC cannot open the books of the Petroleum Ministry after eight years of being ran from Obasanjo’s bedroom, do a value-free and not hatchet audit of the PTDF and bring those that ran the state of annoying paradox we have now found ourselves to book, then it should spare Nigerians of his occasional theatrics that has rather served to distort our perception as the country was overran by the most ruinous corruption in its history between 1999 and 2007. Ribadu should tell us what he has found out of the Niger Delta governors between 1999 and 2007 and this includes that of my own Imo and what is delaying their appearance in court. Is it because they are now eternal Otta-based praise singers? What of the PDP rookie governors in the South West? We should know whether they are still being shielded from trial because they are still cloaked with an immunity secured from stealing the votes of the people.
And this brings me to the mother of the trials; the probe of the 2007 fraud called elections. Is Ribadu pretending he is not aware of the great demand that such dubiety is unraveled and appropriate sanctions meted out to perpetrators so that we would not be eternally bugged down with thieving politicians that owe nothing to the people but to their godfathers? If he does not see the connect between brazen vote stealing and economic corruption just because the vote robbery tallied with his master’s desires then let him go home and allow Nigerians to mourn their fate with rouges and serial fraudsters who take turns to rape us in the name of governance. There \are so many other sore points that need be tackled for Ribadu to regain the badly dented image he courted at the earlier stage of his commission. He knows these more than I do and his is to choose whether to deal with them or continue hiding under his fingers as he did during the later parts of the Obasanjo years as he decided to play a hatchet role that landed us on the deadlocked state we are sweating in presently.
Peter Claver Oparah
Ikeja, Lagos.
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Posted by Robot| 18.07.2007 09:13