With the recent revelations as regards the 2.1billion dollars
arms deal, Nigerians are gradually itching themselves as to the reality and enormity
of the heist that beclouded the last administration in a lot of respect. The
revelation from Magu Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
EFCC that ex-President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan cannot be arrested because there
was no document linking him to the sleaze carried out by his appointees has
upped the anger of Nigerians concerning the connivance of those in his kitchen
cabinet or what some may call his “trusted aides” to work against his
agenda without his knowledge.
While reiterating his desire to tackle corruption, President
Muhammadu Buhari had insisted that he will restrict his anti-corruption war to
the Goodluck Jonathan administration. Nigerians included my humble self kicked
against it insisting that he enlarges the dragnet to previous administrations
with others suggesting he starts the probes from the period of Tafawa Balewa.
But with the way and manner just one set of probe is revealing so much can of worms,
we cannot help understanding why President Buhari opted to probe only the Jonathan’s
administration for now.
Every facet of the former administration was riddled with corruption
perpetrated by his trusted aides. The issue of corruption which should have
been as discreet as possible was glorified to unimaginable heights. Government
officials brazenly displayed ill-gotten wealth, living extravagant lifestyles
while the people wallowed in untold hardship.
The fact that these criminals carried out this stealing while
posturing that they were working for the interest of the former administration
tells us the extent to which these persons went in their fiendish desire to
enrich themselves.
Just like President Buhari, I will want to limit the scope of
this piece to the corruption that took place in the arms deal (Dasukigate as
some will call it) where the nation’s funds meant for security were criminally disbursed to politicians while
pressing needs were left unattended to.
For the records, saying that Goodluck Jonathan did not
perform well will be a big lie because he did what he thought was the best for
the country ensuring that the nation’s infrastructural needs were to a large
extent looked into. But did the people he trusted to ensure that his
transformation agenda succeeds do the right thing? I guess not. If anyone is
thinking contrarily he or she should investigate when the funds from Dasuki
were shared to these politicians and the person will discover that the slush
funds were shared among themselves during the peak of the insurgency and
violence that ravaged the country.
What makes this Dasukigate the more annoying is that these
people would have in the course of trying to get accelerated approvals for
these funds, sponsored violence against the people they claimed to protecting.
This may have accounted for the information leakages and fake intels that was
fed to the then government of the day.
To say that those involved in the Dasukigate saga are heinous
will be an understatement. They are evil and must be seen to be so. It is for
this reason that we all as Nigerians must join hands in our support for the
present administration to succeed in this anticorruption war. The corruption
perpetrated by these criminal elements was the height of madness enveloped in
greed and insensitivity of the highest order and their actions must be treated
as what it is. How on earth can people be so mean on their fellow citizens and
still try to hide under the guise of party oppression? They blatantly also
refused to inform them of the distribution of such funds even when there were requests
by party faithful for mobilisation funds. Are they saying what they are accused
of did not happen? Or that they are being persecuted for deceiving the former
President who reposed so much confidence on them?
My organisation Niger Delta Renaissance Organisation NDRO
supported the former President and his party for reelection but with the
revelations today, we cannot help but urge Nigerians to back President Muhammadu
Buhari anti-corruption war without politicizing it.
The worse aspect of the Dasukigate scandal is that even those
given money in the guise of ensuring that President Jonathan was reelected
never used the money for the assignment they were given rather they diverted
the money for their personal use deceiving Nigerian youths to come out for
campaigns only to abandon them penniless
after the campaigns.
There are times in life when things do not work as expected.
When such occur we must never fail to put our trust in God and expect that he
has better plans for us. With the failure of former President Goodluck Jonathan
to get reelected most of us that supported him with our hard earned resources sulked
and sulked but with hindsight today, we are beginning to know why God gave
victory to Buhari so this slide to a criminal state will stop.
What we are just seeing is the corruption in a particular
office alone (Office of the National Security Adviser) what about others. The
Niger Delta Development Commission has been bedeviled with corruption. If the
corruption there starts coming to public view people will have no option than
to call for imprisonment of those involved for life. Is it the office of the
Secretary to the government of the Federation that is left out of the sleaze or
the National Assembly Service Commission or Dizeani Allison Madueke’s Nigeria
National Petroleum Corruption NNPC or where? The stench of corruption was just
everywhere.
As a Niger Delta activist and patriotic Nigerian, I believe
with the way the Present administration is taking this fight that it is sincere
in its efforts to instill fiscal discipline and plug all leakages. The sack of
the Niger Delta Development Commission Managing Director and his Executive
Directors is highly welcome. I may not know the present acting Managing
Director much but do hope that she will do all she can to key into the
philosophy of the present administration by exposing the corruption at the
Commission. The amnesty Programme another conduit for criminal transfer of
funds is being audited and it will definitely be of good impact in the
empowerment of the beneficiaries of the programme.
One positive intervention of the Nigerian Government that has
failed the expectations of the people of the region is the Ministry of Niger Delta
Affairs. Most of us here hardly know if it does exist again because of the
failure of former Ministers that piloted the activities of the office to make
positive impact. It was not unexpected that a former minister in the ministry
who had the penchant for so much noise and commotion is answering questions
related to corruption while in office. The ministry as it is today with Pastor
Usani Usani I believe will not fail the people like his predecessors. Aside
these, there are many reasons why we the people of Niger Delta must at least
for the benefit of doubt give the present administration our support and
hopefully, it will succeed for the general good of our great country.
Comments
Post a Comment