One of my best hobbies is engaging in deep conversations with my contemporaries who have formidable amount of sources in government. I do get a lot of information from these sorts of engagements and I can confirm that my last conversation with a new friend whom I met through another friend, was so beautiful and rich in contents about certain factual information about the making and gross, persistent mismanagement of Nigeria by political and military leaders who have led Nigeria at some levels in the past and present.
In our conversations, two issues that played out in the last few days featured prominently, which support the clamour to build a strong Nigeria rather than allow for the transformation of the elected President into a strong man who wantonly undermines the functionality of institutions due to selfish ambitions. Under this government, we have noticed that president Tinubu has a personal interest in transforming himself into a strong president and there are many vices that come from being a strong President who feels that he is above the law of the land.
My newly found friend is of the considered opinion that the leadership mismanagement of Nigeria is so damaging that it appears irredeemable.
Believing that we are not all bad in Nigeria, I then sounded more optimistic because my view is that if Nigerians can collectively work to get a strong Nigeria and work against the emergence of a strong President, then the hopes would brighten that in no time we can repair the damages that have been inflicted by past and present leaders in the body politic of Nigeria. I think honestly that no issue is beyond public debate and of course the need for a national conference to determine the fate of a United Nigeria and the terms of engagements of all the nationalities, has become increasingly urgent as we speak.
Besides, I believe that citizens-led vigilance would compel the present-day political office holders to face their jobs, respect and adhere strictly to the principles of transparency and accountability and thereby occasion the emergence of good governance that would last for virtually a lifetime, God helping us. The Nigerian President must not become such a strong big man who feels that he is above the laws. Everyone in Nigeria must therefore accept that we are all equal before the laws.
As aforementioned, one of the two issues of our conversation is the disclosure by the wife of the late military ruler General Sani Abacha, Mrs. Maryam Abacha, that under the nose of a certain president, billions of dollars stashed in safe accounts for Nigeria were retrieved, stolen and disappeared without any trace as soon as her husband’s suspicious unnatural death occured.
The amount is above $5 billion US Dollars stashed in safe accounts in Switzerland and USA amongst a few other places just as the government of President Olusegun Obasanjo reportedly retrieved a huge chunk of this stashed money and we were told that the money was used to build national infrastructures for the good of Nigerians. President Tinubu through the federal Attorney General also retrieved some funds running into hundreds of millions of dollars from the USA.
Mrs. Abacha’s latest revelation is a fresh perspective from someone with profound knowledge of how the cash was stolen and taken into private accounts of politicians in public offices. This statement of Mrs. Maryam Abacha is weighty and must be investigated and not washed down the dirty drain of corruption and inaction. The wife of Sani Abacha needs to update us on the exact amounts and locations of where these funds were stashed. The exact period of when the money was stolen should also be made available tonthe reading public.
This information in greater detail, is that a former First Lady, Hajia Maryam Sani Abacha, has said her late spouse, Gen. Sani Abacha, did not steal Nigeria’s money as alleged in certain quarters.
Rather, she claimed, the late military leader saved money for Nigeria, but it was looted after his demise.
She, therefore, challenged those alleging her husband looted the nation’s treasury to substantiate their claims with unassailable facts.
Abacha, ruled Nigeria from 1993 to 1998, after sacking the Earnest Shonekan-led Interim Government in the wake of the June 12, 1993 presidential elections annulled under the watch of the military president, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida.
…The recovered loots
The total amount of looted funds recovered from the late Head of State, General Sani Abacha, in the past 24 years was put at $5.12 billion.
The second issue touched on the gross mismanagement of the privatisation of some public enterprises in the electricity power sector.
An insight has been revealed how, personal interest, rather than public good severely underpinned the unbundling of the now defunct National Electricity Power Authority (NEPA) and the sale of its subsequent units to the public.
The allegations, made by an insider, paint a picture of sleaze. This corruption explains why there is grave inefficiency in the electricity power sector.
Former Minister of National Planning Commission in the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan, Dr. Shamsuddeen Usman, who spilled the beans, revealed how politicians and officials in the administration jostled for shares in the power generation (GenCo) and distribution companies (DisCos) that were privatised in 2013.
The Minister spoke in Abuja at the 26th October Lecture of the Nigerian Society of Engineers.
Usman said government officials who, ordinarily, should have been neutral in the privatisation exercise, were, however, guilty of diversions of the proceeds and the sabotaging of the process for personal gains. Now looking at how the nation suffered from unending electricity crisis, one is left to say that were the anti-graft institutions of EFCC and ICPC were free from political interference, then we deserve to know all the persons who mismanaged the electricity power sector privatisation.
It is important that fundamental amendments to Electoral Act to strengthen the independence of INEC is key to elimination of electoral heists and corruption that often mar elections in Nigeria. The policing institution is heavily compromised and this is why law enforcement is deprived of the desired zeal, commitment and eagerness to deliver justice to criminals who are responsible for the deep dysfunctionality of Nigeria.
Often we see law enforcement agencies working at cross purposes which denies the nation the opportunity of retrieving looted funds from the public coffers. So what Nigeria need is a strong Nigeria and not a strong President who doesn’t fear the consequences of putting his self-interest in conflict with public interests. One area of conflict of interest committed by President Tinubu is in the award of the road construction from Lagos to Calabar.
According to Punch, a faction of the Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere, has stirred a political storm by demanding the impeachment of President Bola Tinubu over his public remarks linking him personally to the contractor executing the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway project. The group described Tinubu’s declaration as a self-damaging admission of conflict of interest, sparking renewed debate over transparency and accountability in the award of federal contracts.
Oba Oladipo Olaitan, leader of the Afenifere faction, criticized Tinubu for openly referring to the project’s contractor, Gilbert Chagoury, as his “partner in daring,” during the recent inauguration of a 30-kilometre segment of the controversial coastal highway. The road, being handled by Hitech Construction—a subsidiary of the Chagoury Group and the same firm behind the Eko Atlantic City project—has been the focus of increasing scrutiny over its procurement process and potential benefit to private interests.
Olaitan expressed outrage, calling the president’s acknowledgment a blatant admission of using public office to advance personal alliances. According to him, awarding a multibillion-naira federal infrastructure project without an open and competitive bidding process was indefensible and potentially unconstitutional. He argued that the road, which critics claim appears to lead directly to the Eko Atlantic City—a real estate mega project associated with Chagoury—serves private gains under the guise of national development.
“This is no longer speculation; the president himself has called the contractor his partner. That effectively means he awarded a federal project to himself,” Olaitan said. He added that with only a small fraction of the road commissioned—roughly four per cent—it raises fears that the government may abandon the rest of the coastal highway once it reaches the private development site.
“The government has no interest in completing the entire project,” he asserted. “It’s a strategic ploy to pave access to a private enclave disguised as a national road. If the National Assembly fails to act, then they are complicit in this abuse of power.”
He called on the legislature to begin impeachment proceedings immediately, insisting that Tinubu’s admission constitutes a breach of public trust and an abuse of office.
He said; “I am calling on the National Assembly to start the impeachment process now if they are a truly independent and vibrant national assembly and if they are not equally complicit.”
EMMANUEL ONWUBIKO IS THE FOUNDER OF THE HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA and was a NATIONAL COMMISSIONER OF THE NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION.
