Give President Goodluck Jonathan hundred years to rule Nigeria, he
will not successfully prosecute even one person in his much vaunted
fight against corruption. In fact, as a rule, there’ll be a sort of
liberalization of corruption under his watch. The image of invincibility
he creates about corruption helps him sustain his personal – but
nauseatingly pedestrian – idea of corruption being a Nigerian thing that
can never be tackled by anybody.
This isn’t one simplistic assumption. I can stake anything for this
claim. Mr Jonathan is a creation of the corruption he tells people that
he’s fighting. In 2006, he was indicted for false declaration of assets
by a Joint Task Force (JTF) on corruption that was set up by Obasanjo’s
government. That powerful panel was headed by Nuhu Ribadu (yes, the same
Ribadu you know) then as the chairman of the Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission (EFCC).
The Joint Task Force said Mr Jonathan was in possession of
illegally-acquired property such as homes and exotic cars he could not
explain within his legitimate income. While he was invited for hearing,
he claimed he bought them from his “savings”. Meanwhile, he was a
lecturer in the few years following his becoming a deputy governor. Now
hear the worth of the properties which were brought from Mr Jonathan’s
‘savings’: a seven-bedroom duplex worth N18 million at Otuke Ogbia LGA
acquired in2001; a four-bedroom duplex, valued at N15 million at
Goodluck Jonathan Street, Yenegoa, acquired in 2003; and a five-bedroom
duplex, at Citec Villas, Gwarimpa II – Abuja, valued at N25 million,
also acquired in 2003. There were also two cars: a Lexus Jeep valued at
N18 million; and a BMW 7351 Series worth N5.5 million. If you check the
dates, the purchases were made starting from 2001, just two years after
becoming a deputy to a criminal governor convicted for fleecing Bayelsa
state.
So Mr President, a candidate for prison who had no business being in
Aso Rock ab initio, became appointed the running mate of Late President
Yar’Adua by Obasanjo, the same president whose powerful committee
indicted him. This is the core of the matter with corruption under
Jonathan. He’s a cheerleader for the corrupt, and he seems, I have
observed with deep concern, to always be excited whenever there’s a
stage-managed drama to ridicule the outcome of serious probes that
indict key members of his government.
It is not that we all do not have a past that we may be ashamed of;
it is about having a sad past we still live in and cherish. This
president still resides in his past, a past he should not be proud of,
but a past he desires, unfortunately, to have every public official
under him share from. This is why Mr Jonathan is dangerous for Nigeria.
Any country that values decency and is desirous of economic growth
cannot afford to have as its leader a man who is an apostle of primitive
acquisition of wealth.
In my previous essays, I have insisted, and with proofs, that Nigeria
cannot step out of where we are economically if we don’t wage a true
war against corruption and impunity. The war I mean isn’t Jonathan’s
committee’s setting approach. The war I know is the type that’ll be led
by the president himself.
It requires a certain depth of love for country by the head of the
country’s government himself. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any sign
from Mr Jonathan that he loves Nigeria. If he lays any claim to ’love
for country’, then I can wager the reason: enough free oil money to
corner.
I don’t know of any administration in either pre or post-independence
Nigeria that has been rocked by the weight of financial scandals under
Mr Jonathan’s gleeful watch. He simply sets up a committee, and have
aides arrange how to mock its outcome.
Last year, the legislature approved for Nigeria N240b for fuel
subsidy, and then before the year ran out, Mr Jonathan’s government had
already spent over a trillion naira on that without batting an eyelid.
Then when it appeared their recklessness had thrust illiquidity upon
their faces, they pushed the cost of the roguery of their friends onto
Nigerians and titled it subsidy removal. We vehemently refused that, and
argued, as every average thinking person would, that the answer lied in
prosecuting those who defrauded the Nation of trillions of its revenue,
and recovering the funds from them. They pushed their way through. At a
town-hall meeting to sell their untruths to Nigerians, Mrs
Okonjo-Iweala even delved into the ridiculous when she alluded to the
need for us to help them fish out those who sabotage the nation
economically. Well, that comment ended up being one of the many jokes,
albeit very unintelligent ones, that have been dropping out of her mouth
since she joined this government.
The push of Nigerians for transparency in the management of their oil
revenue led the responsive House of Representatives into setting up an
adhoc committee that probed the management of the subsidy regime. Headed
by Farouk Lawan, the committee doubled-down on government’s complicity
in the subsidy fraud, and even the roles played by key government
agencies and parastatals in destroying the country they were set up to
serve. But as the committee was at work, Femi Otedola, one of the three
closest businessmen to the president (the other two are Aliko Dangote
and Aig Aigboje Imoukhuede of Access Bank) was out to rubbish the report
and render it useless. He set Farouk up and bribed him with some dollar
bills. When it was time to use the ploy in the achievement of its
original purpose, Femi Otedola proudly informed Nigerians that he gave
bribe to a legislator. There was joy in Jonathan’s presidency. As you
read these, Otedola is the president’s Man-Friday, walking freely on the
streets and even attending some important state functions with him.
The Jonathan camp changed the narrative. Farouk Lawan’s report was
now labeled as lacking in credibility. It was shocking. Nobody talked
about why it should be implemented while the culprits in the bribery
saga get prosecuted for such massive economic sabotage. Don’t prosecute
them since Femi was involved. Just rubbish Farouk and then kill the
report.
And then came the Petroleum Revenue Task Force headed by Nuhu Ribadu.
It was set up by this same government to look into the affairs of the
oil industry from 2002 – 2012. The committee’s report has long been
ready. It was formally presented to the president on Friday where
another comedy, in the manner of Otedola’s, played out. Mr. Steve
Oronsaye, Nigeria’s former Head of Service and Vice Chairman of the Task
Force played the spoiler. He was part of the committee but was not
attending deliberations until it was time to discuss recovery of funds
owed by some companies. He attended the meeting and then scuttled the
Task Force’s efforts to recover $1.5billion from Addax Petroleum.
Justifying his well calculated attempt to make nonsense of the
report, Mr Oronsaye claimed he was a believer in processes, and that the
process that led to the compilation of the report was flawed and so
‘unimplementable’. Oronsaye did not have the courage to tell Nigerians
that he accepted appointment into the board of NNPC even while still
serving as a member of the Task Force, and that such was a necessary
condition to erode his objectivity on the matter. Oronsaye did not have
the decency to resign his membership of that Task Force when he took up
the board membership appointment. That must be how ‘credible’ people act
in the world Mr Oronsaye happened from.
Which leads to the next question: Who appointed Steve Oronsaye in the
NNPC board while he was carrying out another task that entailed
auditing the same NNPC? Was the presidency not aware of the conflict of
interest in that regard? Was Steve the only Nigerian qualified to be a
board member of NNPC such that he would need to serve in the committee
that probes the corporation a board member of which he is? Mr Oronsaye
must have been planted in that Task Force to discredit it.
And if the only issue Mr Oronsaye has with the recommendations is the
process in their compilation, and not the recommendations themselves,
why did he declare them ‘unimplementable’? One would have thought that
the real issue is in whether the recommendations were outside what the
Task Force members collectively agreed upon.
My understanding of how this corruption-building administration of
Goodluck Jonathan works tells me this was designed to ensure corruption
in the oil industry remains blossoming.
The report reveals that between 2008 and 2011, Nigerian oil ministers
handed out no fewer than seven discretionary licences and claimed that a
total of $183 million (about N28.7 billion in signature bonuses was
missing from the deals. The report also claimed that three of the oil
licences in question were awarded within the tenure of the present
Petroleum Minister, Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke. Diezani was indicted by
the Task Force. This isn’t the first time she’s being indicted in a
probe of this manner.
The whole drama is to rub it on our faces that Goodluck Jonathan is
comfortable with corruption. He will neither sack Diezani nor give
Nigerians any reason to assert that she is indeed corrupt even in the
face of prima facie evidences. And there are always Oronsaye’s and
Otedolas who are willing to help out.
Those who are surprised – I wonder who should still be by now, anyway –
about the game of deceit in President Goodluck Jonathan’s government
may need to take time to study more the man they expect good governance
from. A man who desires everybody around him to share from the proceeds
of sleaze will not stop the growth of sleaze. What you tolerate you
cannot exterminate.
Any leader who doesn’t see as evil the mismanagement of public funds
isn’t fit to lead even himself, let alone his household. This is the
character that runs today’s Aso Rock. And this is unfortunate.
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