 |
| Buhari |
Friday, 29th May 2015 may
just be another day in the calendar, but in the Nigerian political landscape it
is a very critical one. For a start, that is when the first opposition
candidate to defeat an incumbent will make history to be handed the baton of
leadership by a sitting president.
So, while the outgoing president
Goodluck Ebele Jonathan is handing over to ex-military dictator, General
Muhammadu Buhari (rtd.), some of the current president’s aides are jittery over
what would become their fate in the succeeding days.
Top on the list of those having
goose bumps are the minister of Petroleum, Mrs Diezani Allison-Madueke who has
not had it easy since the defeat suffered by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP,
in the 2015 presidential elections held on March 28, and the coordinating
minister of Finance, Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.
 |
| Okonjo-Iweala |
The source of their fear is their
inability to give good account of the continuous disappearance of about $20
billion from the coffers of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC,
almost two years after this came to light. The lid was first blown open by the then
governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi who
got the boot for his pains. Mallam
Sanusi, who is currently the Emir of Kano, first raised the alarm concerning
some missing money on 25th September 2013. He was said to have
written to the president, Goodluck Jonathan informing him of non-remittance of
the sum of $49 billion to the federation account by the NNPC. The letter was
also said to have been leaked to journalists, which must have elicited his sack.
The CBN governor met with the two ministers who said $10 billion rather than
$49 billion was missing, but in January 2014, through another letter, Mallam
Sanusi accused both ministers of telling lies, claiming this time that the
total missing money was $20 billion.
The belief in many quarters is that
the new president will make investigation into the missing $20 billion a top
priority of his administration, and of course his first major assignment after
being sworn into office. Aside from the fact that his body language suggests
so, his antecedents in his first shot in governance as a military head of state
between 1983 and 1985 leaves little doubts as to the fact that some of these
ministers may be jailed. And recently he voiced out his determination to get
the missing money back to the coffers of the government.
 |
| Diezani |
During the brief period, Buhari and
his second-in-command, late Brig. Tunde Idiagbon, had thrown a lot of people,
politicians and others alike into jail in the course of fighting the rots that
were evident in the system.
Throughout the presidential
campaigns of the All Progressive Congress, APC, the singsong was fighting
corruption and all indicators point to the missing N20 billion as the starting
point of the war against corruption.
As Nigerians watch with bated breath
for a new dawn in Nigerian political history, Beth News will surely keep you
abreast with happenstances as it affects our corrupt politicians.
No comments:
Post a Comment