Wonders Shall Never End:::Father And Son Appointed As Chairman And Managing Director Of Fed. Govt. Agency

Senate queries minister over Gemade, son’s appointments in FHA

Ayodele Adesanmi, Abuja - 28.05.2009

THE Senate has summoned the Minister of Works, Housing and Urban Development, Dr. Hassan Lawan, to appear before it to explain how a father and son were appointed Chairman and Managing Director respectively of a single federal agency.

It alleged that Chief Barnabas Gemade, former national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was appointed as the chairman of the Federal Housing Authority (FHA) Board and his biological son, Mr. Tever Gemade, an architect, as Managing Director of the same agency, believing it ran foul of the constitution.

The minister is to appear on Tuesday, June 2, 2009, at the Hearing Room 107, Senate New Building by 1.00 p.m. The invitation was sequel to a letter by the Chairman, Senate Committee on Housing and Urban Development, Ikechukwu Obiora, that the minister should explain if such appointment complied with the federal character principle enshrined in Section 14.3 of the Constitution.

The letter with reference number SS/S/COH/20/02/Vol.1/31 and dated Tuesday 26th May, 2009 reads in part: “I write to invite you to appear before the Senate committee on Housing and Urban Development to explain whether the appointments of Chief Barnabas Gemade as Chairman of the FHA Board and Architect Tever Gemade, as Managing Director of the same Agency, both of whom are from the same family, comply with the federal character principle enshrined in Section 14.3 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”

The meeting will hold on Tuesday 2nd June, 2009 at Hearing Room 107, Senate New Building at 1.00 p.m.

http://www.tribune.com.ng/28052009/news/news7.html

Governor Daniel Of Ogun State Spent N1.5 billion on 50th birthday and foreign trips

Nigerian politicians are a heartless bunch. In this era of belt tightening and where governments at all tiers all over the world are trying to be frugal and prudent in the management of the scarce resources at their disposal due to the global economic melt down, it is reported that Ogun spent N1.5 billion on Governor Daniel's 50th birthday and foreign trips. Is that justifiable?

The Nation Newspapers of Feb. 21, 2009 with the caption "Ogun spends N1.5b on Daniel's 50th birthday, foreign trips" wrote that the Ogun State government has been accused of spending over N1.5b on the 50th birthday celebration of the state governor Otunba Gbenga Daniel, foreign trips and what has been described as "maintenance of law and order" between 2004 and 2006.

A petition sent to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Crimes Commission (ICPC) and the Inspector General of Police has alleged large scale spending spree in the state.

According to the petition, Daniel and his wife, Yeye Olufunke, embarked on 49 and 31 foreign trips respectively at a cost of N450 million.

The petitioner also alleged that the state spent N487, 968,745 during the governor's 50th birthday celebrations.

Giving a breakdown, the petitioner said the sum of N15,202,560 was spent in paying for the celebration, another N1,200,000 on production of personal memoir with cheque no 00000695 drawn in favour of a new generation bank, another cheque of N7,242,560 from the same bank.

The petitioner reveals further that a cheque of N1.5m in respect of the birthday was also issued. The money was withdrawn from a first generation bank. The cheque number was given as 41640863.

Also in preparation for a get-together for the birthday, N5, 260,000 was issued in respect of the same first generation bank, the petitioner alleged.

The Paper also wrote that in 2005, during the governor's 49th birthday celebration, it was alleged that two separate cheques were issued for the lecture delivered on that day. The amounts, N1, 550,000 and N807, 400 were withdrawn from the defunct Bond bank.

The governor was further accused of spending N281m on what the petitioner described as "maintenance of law and order."

In the petition, it was alleged that N23m was spent in combating cultism under such titles as "curbing violence in Ogun State ".

"Government claims that it spent an average of N1, on "Anti-Violence Committee" on campuses every month while cash position as at May 21, 2004 recorded that N1.5m was spent," the petition equally alleged.

But this was contrary to the actual as records showed that N300, 000 was paid to the committee for the month of August 2004 while N1m was recorded as having been spent on eradication of cultism. Another sum of N7.4m "was recorded to have been dolled out to Youth leaders in Ogun State," the petitioner alleged.

http://nigeriaworld.com/feature/publication/ubochi/022409.html

Gov Daniel’s Cook Keeps N400Million In Bank Accounts

Gov Daniel’s Cook Keeps N400Million In Bank Accounts
May 28, 2009 17:30 (2 hours ago)
By Jide Osokoya

The police in Ogun state have claimed that N400 million has been found in two bank accounts of a cook to the state’s governor, Otunba Gbenga Daniel, P.M.NEWS learnt in Abeokuta, this morning.

However, from the governor’s office, Okemosan, came a rebuttal that the money found in the accounts was ‘just N13 milliom’. The accounts maintained by the cook, Tope Ikujenyo, are lodged with IBTC/Stanbic and Intercontinental Bank. The cook was arrested on Monday, inside the governor’s private library where he had attempted to steal a huge sum of money belonging to his boss. After his arrest and detention at the Ogun State Police Command, Eleweran, Abeokuta, the 26-year-old Ikorodu-born domestic staff was said to have confessed to the police that though he was unlucky the day he was caught, he had been taking money from there for a long time.

Impeccable police sources who revealed the financial scandal, told P.M.NEWS, that Tope’s two secret bank accounts were exposed by a transaction alert on his phone in the course of interrogation by the police. The sources revealed that on tracing the accounts to IBTC/Stanbic and Intercontinental banks, the total amount found was about N400 million, adding that they were being hampered in their investigation by close aides of the governor’s. “We would have extracted a lot of vital information from the suspect, but the Deputy Chief of Staff to governor Daniel, Mr. Soji Akin-Bankole, told us not to torture the man,” the police sources informed P.M.NEWS.

An inside source at the governor’s office at Okemosan, who confirmed the discovery of Tope Ikujenyo’s two bank accounts, stated that the amount being circulated in the secretariat was N13 million, but quickly added that it could be an official figure. When contacted, the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), Ogun State Police Command, Mr. Muyiwa Awojobi, said he heard about the issue but had not been briefed. Said the PPRO this morning: “I’ve not been properly briefed about the matter and I did not receive any signal to that effect, even though journalists have been calling me since yesterday about the issue.”

He, however, promised to get back to P.M.NEWS after he might have been briefed on the case. Reacting to the story, the Chief Press Secretary (CPS) to the governor, Mr. Adegbenro Adebanjo, said: “Once again, that is another of such fictions about Ogun state that we hear and read regularly. “The fact is that a steward was discovered to have illegally entered the study room of the governor’s. Police are investigating the incident. However, no dime of government money was stolen.” Adebanjo had earlier told journalists that nothing like that happened.

The Clowns Are At It again::National Assembly plans to spend N159m on Democracy Day

N’Assembly plans to spend N159m on Democracy Day
By Ademola Adedeji, John Alechenu and John Ameh, Abuja
Published: Monday, 25 May 2009

Despite the global financial meltdown, the National Assembly may spend N159m to mark the 10th anniversary of the return of democracy to Nigeria on Friday.

President of the Senate, Mr. David Mark

It was gathered on Sunday that the week-long event, which begins on Thursday, would feature lectures, symposia, awards and a gala night.

For example, certificates, memorabilia and plaques will gulp N10m and the gala night, N2m.

A proposal for the events, it was gathered, was being handled by a director in the office of the Clerk to the National Assembly, Alhaji Nasiru Arab.

Details of the expenditure also showed that N25m will be spent to produce 5,000 copies of the National Assembly year book and N15m on 5,000 handbooks.

However, it was learnt that a tripartite committee comprising the National Assembly management, the Senate and the House of Representatives would implement the programme.

A source told one of our correspondents that the Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Information, Senator Ayogu Eze, heads the committee.

The source said that Arab was enthusiastic to make the celebration “a huge success because it is going to be his last public outing before his retirement from the service.”

When asked on preparations for the event, the Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Mr. Eseme Eyiboh, said Nigerians should not scream over the financial implications of such a celebration, rather they should look at what would be achieved.

He said it was an event that called for a review of the past 10 years of democracy in the country, stressing that it would provide the planners of the events, the opportunity to look into areas that needed to be seriously addressed.

Eyibo said the financial meltdown should not discourage Nigerians from celebrating a milestone in the nation’s democratic experience, stressing that this was the first time in the country’s history that democracy spanned 10 years.

Eze, who admitted that the committee met last Thursday and asked the secretariat to draw the estimate, added that the occasion was not for merry-making.

He said, “The occasion is not a bash. If not because of the significance to us in Nigeria – 10 years of uninterrupted democratic rule – it is not something others would want to celebrate.

“The budget has not even been drawn up. I can assure you that the amount you are calling is strange and we don’t have that kind of money. We met last Thursday and asked the secretariat to give us the estimate.”

Meanwhile, the Conference of Nigeria Political Parties on Sunday declared a one-week of mourning for democractic practice in Nigeria, saying the country was dangerously sliding into a one party state.

The CNPP, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Osita Okechukwu, said after reviewing the democratic experiment started on May 29, 1999, it came to an inevitable conclusion that the last 10 years could only be classified as “10 Locust years.”

The conference said after reviewing the core ingredients of democracy, it came to the conclusion that the principles of popular government had taken flight from the country

“It is our considered view that indeed Nigerians cannot in all honesty claim to be practicing democracy, when the people’s votes do not count, nor do we have government by the people and for the people; at best we can claim that we are under civil rule,’ it said.

The CNPP added that the result of an opinion poll conducted among Nigerian on whether or not democracy should be celebrated or mourned, indicated that 78 per cent of the respondents voted for the latter.

The statement reads in part, “78 per cent of those sampled gave a damning answer that they were mourning democracy, that there was nothing to rejoice for, when they were not part of decision making, since their votes did not count”, the statement read.

“To them, this is not the democracy Chief M.K.O.Abiola, Maj.-Gen. Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, Bobo Nwosisi, Baguda Kaltho and dozens of Nigerians died fighting for.

“They recall the high expectations and aspirations of Nigerians in getting the military back to the barracks and how those expectations were smashed by ex-president Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

“They lament the death of Chief Bola Ige, Chief Harry Marshal, Chief A.K.Dikibo, Chief Ogbonna Uche, the over 400 that died during the Jos North Local Government election and a host of others too numerous to mention, the hunger in the midst of unprecedented oil receipt, the collapsed infrastructure and monumental corruption.”

The CNPP also said it regretted that despite a whopping N85tn realized between 1999 and 2008 from the sale of the nation’s crude oil , the federal and state governments had failed to solve the problems in the Niger Delta; provide electricity and good roads; and make education as well as health care accessible to the people.

It said the results of government’s poor performance were the crisis in the Niger Delta and the despondency in the land.

The conference further said that Nigerians bemoaned that the little hope raised when President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua assumed office on May 29, 2007 had vanished.

It added that “ the wide gulf between the President’s pronouncement of Seven Point Agenda and inaction, the cold water he poured on war against corruption and the emerging dictatorship emanating from the controversial electoral bills he presented to the National Assembly,” were the reasons why Nigerians had lost hope in his administration.

A wild goose chase

By Musikilu Mojeed

May 23, 2009 10:44PMT
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The Presidential panel headed by the Inspector-General of Police, Mike Okiro, set up to fish out Nigerians involved in the infamous $180 million Halliburton bribery scam is off at a tangent; and official claims that the culprits will be brought to book next month is looking now more like a message of mass deception, findings by NEXT on Sunday has indicated.

On Tuesday, May 12, in the first media briefing into his two-year presidency, Mr. Umaru Yar’ Adua told journalists in Abuja that “I will give you all assurance that it (the investigation) will be pursued to its logical conclusion… (and we will) identify those Nigerians who are involved and make (them) public and prosecute them.”

Four Obstacles:

However, as NEXT on Sunday investigations in Abuja reveal, four major obstacles, stand between the panel and the prospect of diligently prosecuting the investigation that the president has staked his honour to bring to a quick end. These obstacles include the level of seriousness among panelists; the unwillingness to follow obvious leads; as well as the reluctance to invite companies, and presumed sacred cows that have already been indicted in the case locally and abroad. “In all likelihood, the panel has to ask for more time, to save its own face and that of the president” said a top police officer at the weekend.

Worried observers of the investigation confided in NEXT last weekend that members of the panel do not even appear to take the assignment seriously. Rather than personally attend the panel’s sittings, they simply delegated staff in their offices to stand in for them.

Mr. Ahmadu Ali, who is a Commissioner of Police at the Special Investigations Panel, SIP, police headquarters, is now presiding over the panel on behalf of Mr. Okiro. The Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Farida Waziri, is being represented by the head of the Economic Governance Unit of the EFCC, Mr. Umar Sanda. Other members of the panels have also sent in their subordinates to represent them on the committee.

The Federal Government gave the panel eight weeks to complete its assignment. The panel is now well into it’s fifth week. Knowledgeable insiders in Louis Edet House, where the panel seats in Garki, Abuja, moan in frustration that nothing much has been achieved. But preying on the public ignorance on the matter, as well as on the deep anger of citizens, the committee recently triggered a muffled but intensive publicity in the media designed to convey the impression that its work is well apace, and that it is on a significant track.

Nevertheless, none of the four key companies (see box) involved in the bribery scandal have been invited till date to face the panel. A JGC official, the Japanese arm of the TSKJ consortium told NEXT on Sunday in Lagos, Friday, that it had not received any invitation from the panel. The three other companies, according to a source close to the panel, have not been invited too.

To get up to speed on the investigation, the panel would have invited and sought guidance from two key actors who have epitomised the investigations up till this point: Ibrahim Magu, former head of the Economic Governance Unit of the EFCC, and Mr. Chudi Ofodile, a former chairman of the House Committee on Public Complaints who probed the TSKJ scam and wrote an interim report in 2004.

Both men have not been invited and Mr. Magu’s fate even hangs on a loose leash. On account of his investigations on some former governors and some key actors in the TSKJ scam, Mr. Magu was sent on an indefinite suspension last August. A police panel tried him for what is generally perceived to be a witch hunt, found nothing to incriminate him, but still kept him in the cold, for doing a dutiful anti-corruption job for his country.

Caught in a maze:

To worsen matters, however, the panel has triggered a rash of arrests followed by a publicity blitz suggesting that it has identified $150,000,000 of the bribe money seating in a Swiss account belong to a former Air Force General, AVM Abdullah Dominic Bello.

Mr. Bello, who was Chief of Air Staff in the 1980-83 period under President Shehu Shagari, and was also Chief Executive of the defunct Nigerian Airways, is presumed to be the owner of the Tristar account through which Mr. Jeffery Tesler, the chief mastermind of the bribery scandal, distributed all the bribe. The panel believes that Abdullahi Bello has a strong and long standing relationship with Mr. Tesler and Tristar.

While Mr. Tesler had always claimed that he was the sole owner of Tristar, American investigators hold the view that Bello might be the real owner of Tristar. The US Security and Exchange Commission said it was in possession of Tristar’s corporate and bank account opening documents suggesting that shares in Tristar were held by nominees for the benefit of Bello.

It is this allegation against him that the Okiro panel wanted Mr. Bello to explain. At the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) in Abuja, a 1998 registered entity domiciled in Kaduna announces itself as Tri-Star but has no reference to Bello as any of the two promoters, except if they act as clones or fronts for him. Yet, the Tristar that Tesler used to funnel his bribe to the high brow Nigerian officials, way back to 1995, was registered in Gibraltar.

By arresting Mr. Bello, however, the panel opened a new pathway in the investigation that offers it the convenience to ignore the central characters in the scandal.

American investigators have long determined that three former presidents; Obasanjo, Abacha and Abubakar, as well as a who’s who of Nigeria’s political and business elite received millions of dollars in bribes from American and European contractors retained to build the Nigerian liquefied natural gas plant in Bonny, Rivers State.

Also enmeshed in the vast bribery scheme is an endless train of bureaucrats, top politicians, state and local officials and Dan Etete, former oil minister in the administration of the late General Sani Abacha. In all, the Nigerian bribe takers accepted about ₦27 billion in bribes and while the American authorities are busy pursuing their own citizens and corporations, in connection with the scandal, Nigerian law enforcement authorities have in reality done little to pursue those indicted in this scandal.

Besides Bello, the panel also arrested Ibrahim Aliyu, a former secretary to the Niger State government, former Chairman of the Nigerian Industrial Development Bank, NIDB, and head of the transition team of Abdulsalam Abubakar that ushered in the Obasanjo administration into office in 1999. It is unclear what the Okiro panel really wanted from Mr. Aliyu whose arrest, attorneys from the law offices of Paul Usoro, a senior advocate of Nigeria averred in court documents to secure his freedom, that no charges where put before him prior to arrest, making him look like a high priced lead. Even when the court asked that Mr. Aliyu be released, the panel kept him on for half a week before letting him go on health grounds. Mr. Aliyu treats a prostrate case, according to his lawyers.

However, US investigators had always wished to get a sense of Mr. Aliyu’s connection to Mr. Tesler and the Tristar accounts. A theory was to explore whether he could be a reliable lead to Mr. Abdulsalam, and indeed establish if he was the bagman of the former head of state. In April 2008, the US investigators pressed their curiosity through a letter they sent to the EFCC, asking the agency’s help, through the international cooperation agreement between them, to help clear this foggy area of the scandal.

What the American Saw:

The US request letter laid bare some leads: for instance, it claims that companies associated with Mr. Aliyu received huge monies from Tristar following the signing of the second contract between Tristar and TSKJ in March 1999.

Between May 1999 and July 2000, the report also claimed, Tesler wired $7,108,675 to an account in the name of Sherwood Petroleum Limited at Barclays Bank in Guernsey, The Channel Islands. Another $2.5million was transferred to an account belonging to Urban Shelter Limited at Baring Brothers Bank in Geneva, Switzerland on January 16, 2001 according to the claims of the letter.

This account, owned and controlled by Mr. Aliyu, in turn transferred funds to an account in the name of Satellite Properties Limited, which the Americans claimed was also owned and controlled by Mr. Aliyu.

On January 8, 2002, Tristar again wired $3million to an account in the name of Intercellular Nigeria Limited at Paine Webber, a securities brokerage firm in the US, and on July 8, 2003, the company sent another $2.2million to an account in the name of Fairford Investment Group Limited at Baring Brothers in Geneva. Mr. Aliyu owned and controlled these accounts. The Sherwood Petroleum account, in turn, transferred over $4million to accounts in the name of Mr. Aliyu, Urban Shelter and Satellite Properties.

Mr. Tesler’s attorneys, NEXT on Sunday learnt, have attempted to justify some of the transfers. They claimed that the transfer of $2.2million from Tristar to Fairford Investment was for the acquisition of 20 million shares of stock in Intercellullar on behalf of “clients” of Tesler. They also claimed that the $2.5million sent to Urban Shelter was a deposit towards the purchase of an office complex in Abuja.

Okiro’s Tristar puzzles

Mr. Tesler had claimed that Tristar invested between $5 million to $6 million in Intercellular, acquired commercial real estate in Abuja worth $3 to $4 million, invested more than $10 million in Malabu Oil and Gas, owned by former Petroleum Minister, Dan Etete, and has interests in oilfield development blocks 242, 245 and 256 which were bought off Sherwood petroleum. Are these issues related to the core LNG corruption scandal or a new and perhaps related case?

Now the Okiro panel has less than a month to resolve these entanglements. It remains unclear, as insiders to the investigations revealed last week, how, arresting people who had had dealings with Jeffrey Tesler in the past but who may have little or nothing with the Halliburton LNG Train case, is going to address the concerns of the nation and the promise its president has offered.

Additional reports by Elor Nkereuwem and Idris Akinbajo

Yar’adua: Progress Of The Well-digger

Digging a well is a difficult and dangerous activity. By extension, professional well-digging is a hazardous profession. One has to dig a tubular canal straight into the earth. Air is scant, breathing difficult and sunlight dim. Sometimes you have to dig through hard rocks. At other times, the soil is either too loose or too muddy. People on the surface cannot see what you are doing nor appreciate your difficulties. Yet in the midst of all these, you have to continue to dig down, in the belief that you will strike water.


In a sense, that is exactly the conundrum President Yar’adua is caught in. Yar’adua believes (or seems to think) that he is digging a well from which the milk and honey of national development would flow. But after two years of waiting patiently, Nigerians are tired. When, in the aftermath of the most rigged election in the history of democracy, Umaru Musa Yar’adua was sworn-in as President of Nigeria, it was a resigned nation that watched the charade as it unfolded. However, the very fact that the nation was getting rid of the despotic and much despised Olusegun Obasanjo meant that we were ready to give the new president a chance.

In his inaugural address, the new president promised a multitude of things including a pledge to do away with the culture of impunity that characterized the Obasanjo era. He promised to declare a state of emergency in the power sector, he promised to improve education, agriculture and transportation. He promised to tackle corruption. He publicly declared his assets. As politicians come, especially within the ranks of the PDP, Nigerians believed Yar’adua was a lesser evil. So against our better judgment, we gave him a chance.

Well, after two years in office, the cautious optimism with which Nigerians received President Yar’adua has given way to despair, and a state of resignation. What Nigerians see today is the picture of a president that is shattered and defeated. His much taunted performance as Katsina governor and stand against corruption, presumably the reasons OBJ and his cohorts dragged him (was he really dragged?) to the Presidency have wilted in the face of real challenges. If he is a ‘performer’, he is yet to get his acts together. If he is against corruption, he is yet to look in-house. Deep in-house. It is said that charity begins at home.

After two years of this administration, the impression one gets is that this well-digger has been overwhelmed by the task at hand. Accepted, he came in with a deeply provincial outlook. Accepted, his health is even at the best of times, fragile. Accepted, he was staggered by the enormity of power at his disposal. Accepted, he was haunted by the crises of legitimacy over his election. Accepted also, that he is besieged by a retinue of former ex- governors who foisted him on us. But we must also accept that he was not forced to accept the job! We are yet to see water from the well he is digging. He has dug so deep that we cannot see him anymore, or even hear him. A huge quantity of debris has been thrown up. Billions of dollars have been thrown down. But we are yet to see a drop of water.

Today, despite his election pledge, the power situation has never been worse. Buying, selling and servicing of generators is big business. Today, the long queues of vehicles at petrol stations throws one back to the contrived scarcity of the Abacha years. Two years after, education is not better off, despite the hopes of many that the former teacher would understand the challenges of the sector. There have been no meaningful developments in agriculture. Remember the fertilizer fiasco? Rather, 200 billion naira is being ‘loaned’ to ‘big time’ farmers. In what ways would this create employment for the millions of jobless Nigerians? It does not require a genius to surmise that these so-called big farmers are retired generals and former public officials who want another bite of the cherry.

Today, it is business as usual in Nigeria. The hope and anticipation have faded. The pogroms and subsequent unconstitutional deportation of Nigerians from Plateau state is indicative that human life is cheaper than ever. In the name of the rule of law, we have returned to the impunity that was a permanent feature of the last government. While hundreds of Nigerians die everyday on roads like the Abuja – Lokoja highway, the same ‘fox’ who refused to ‘fix’ our roads has been sent to ‘fix’ our ports. Our refineries are still comatose. NITEL is still a major public embarrassment. Is its sale to be or not to be? (Even Hamlet would have decided by now!).

On the international scene, the decision of President Obama to visit Ghana in July is a clear indication that our pariah status is back again. (Not that we were really accepted, anyway, in spite of Obasanjo’s illusions of statesmanship). Ghana has had four presidential elections, with the party in office loosing power twice without loss of lives and property. Conversely, elections in Ekiti, one of Nigeria’s smallest states were an unmitigated disaster. Every day in the news, it is the story of one corrupt practice or another. The economy is drifting without direction. The public sector is as usual clueless, except when it comes to devising novel ways of diverting public resources. The stock market has well and truly collapsed. The banking industry is all about an insatiable drive for deposits and nothing else. Moral authority is fundamentally fractured. Indeed, even the so-called vision 2020 is a comedy. Not the type that makes you laugh, though. This would make you weep.

Regardless of all these, our Well-Digger in Chief wants us to believe that all is well. It is akin to former Republican presidential candidate John McCain saying the fundamentals of the US economy were strong when everything around the country was collapsing! President Yar’adua has been at this task for two years. And it has taken all of that time to use the media centre at the Villa for the first time. And his message? To assure Nigerians that we were making progress. But it is not the amount of debris that a well-digger churns out that measures his success. It is how quickly he strikes water. Nigerians have been waiting for two years for the shout ‘ahoy, water’! But we are also beginning to get that sickening feeling again that in our country, the more things change, the more they remain the same.



Suleiman is a student at A.B.U, Zaria. (ssuleiman@gmail.com)

Ribadu Testifies before the U.S Financial Services Committee

Yar'adua's Midterm Report Card-SaharaReporters

Click to enlarge



Saturday, 23 May 2009 00:43 SaharaReporters, New York
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On May 29 2009, Umaru Yar'adua would have spent 2 solid years on the throne of the Nigerian presidency that he and the People's Democratic Party (PDP) usurped fraudulently from Nigerians through a fraudulent general election that took place in April 2007. In assessing his second year in power, Saharareporters came to the inescapable decision to prepare a midterm report card that would be understandable to all Nigerians-young, old, educated, illiterate, poor, rich, weak and strong. We have to say that we could not come to a mathematically acceptable way to express the level of failure of the Yar'adua regime. *EMBARGOED TILL MAY 29 2009. PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY!

See below:

How Elumelu, Others Shared N6Billion

May 21, 2009 14:37, 683 views
By Nnamdi Felix /Abuja


As the controversy over the fraudulent “sharing” of the sum of N6.2 billion belonging to the Rural Electrification Agency between Senator Nicholas Ugbane, Hon. Ndudi Elumelu and others rages, sources within the anti-graft commission have revealed some details on how the alleged fraud was perfected and executed.

Information from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) at our disposal indicate that the members of the House Committee on Power involved in the alleged N6.2 billion fraud and their cohorts at the Rural Electrification Agency met soon after the passage of the supplementary budget late last year, at a five-star hotel in the Abuja metropolis, to harmonise positions on how many companies to be nominated by the participants to benefit from the “contract.”

It was also revealed that they altered the composition of the states designated to benefit from the first phase of the electrification exercise to include participants’ choices which were not included in the list of benefiting areas. Elumelu and others currently facting trial were also said to have defied a directive from the Presidency, issued on 4 December, 2008, directing all agencies to return any unspent budgetary allocation to government coffers immediately. They allegedly converged on the same five-star hotel on 17 December, last year and allegedly issued a deliberately contrived letter of contract award to themselves on the basis of the number of companies “sponsored” by each of them.

The 10 public servants and officers standing trial for the fraud were alleged to have paid out to themselves, on 24 December, 2008, 15 per cent of the various amounts in the respective contracts awarded to their nominated companies. About 64 companies were used in the grand disbursement of the agency’s funds. No prequalification of companies was done in the entire process of the contract award, neither was there any bidding nor tendering procedure adopted as stipulated by the Procurement Act.

It was further gathered that Elumelu and the nine others allegedly paid out to themselves, on 30 December, 2008, the outstanding 85 per cent of the total contract value for their respective nominated companies without recourse to the practice of retaining 10 per cent of contractors’ payment for a period of six months in such contracts to ensure that the jobs executed will stand the test of time. Some of the companies which purportedly got these jobs were yet to move to site even after receiving complete payment for the contracts.

Former customs boss gets chieftaincy title

N6bn electrification scam: Suspect threatens to expose presidency official

Taiwo Adisa, Abuja
Tuesday, May 19, 2009

One of the suspects currently being tried by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in connection with the N6 billion rural electrification scandal has threatened to say what he knows about the alleged deals of a top presidency official.



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Information gathered by the Nigerian Tribune, on Monday, indicated that the suspect, a member of the House of Representatives, was said to have been saddened by the decision of the anti-graft body to rope him into the rural electrification scam, which he believed was a set up.

Some of those who had met with the lawmaker at the weekend confirmed his level of disappointment, just as they confirmed his determination “to bare all at the right time.”

The source said “I can tell you that most of the lawmakers in detention see this as a burden they have to bear, but one of them has expressed disappointment that he was being set up after he had allegedly distinguished himself as a lawmaker in past assignments.”

The source added that the lawmaker believed the whole gamut of the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) scam was aimed at getting at him after his roles in the past.

The lawmaker in question was said to have disclosed his readiness to give details of fertiliser distribution scams and why local farmers may never get the product at subsidised rates.

“We have the details of the serious cartels that run fertiliser business in the country, and I also have details of the role a presidency official plays in the whole deals, if there is a fight against corruption, we should start from there,” the source quoted the lawmaker as saying.

N5.2bn power scam: EFCC freezes contractors’ accounts

EFCC Chairman, Farida Waziri

N5.2bn power scam: EFCC freezes contractors’ accounts
Tobi Soniyi, Abuja

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has obtained a court order to freeze the accounts of the companies used for the contracts for which the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Power, Nicholas Ugbane, and nine others are being prosecuted.

The order was obtained at the Federal High Court in Abuja through an ex parte application.

The EFCC’s lawyer, Chief Godwin Obla, had argued the application while Justice Anwuli Chikere granted the freezing order.

Also, an Abuja High Court had on Monday, remanded Ugbane, and his counterpart in the House of Representatives, Ndudi Elumelu and eight others at Kuje Prison, Abuja till June 4 when it would rule on their bail applications.

The accused are standing trial for allegedly defrauding the Federal Government of N5.2bn.

Also taken to Kuje were the Director-General of the Rural Electrification Agency, Samuel Gekpe, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Power, Abdulahi Aliyu, Simon Nanle, Lawrence Orekoya, Abdulsalmad Jahun, Kayode Oyedeji, Igwe Paulinus and Jibo Mohammed.

All the suspects had filed separate applications for bail which were argued on Monday by their lawyers.

The accused had claimed that they were entitled to the constitutional presumption of innocence at the trial stage.

Having listened to the argument of the parties Justice Adebukonla Banjoko said she had a tight case load and that the earliest date she could rule on the bail applications was June 4.

She, however, said that if she was able to write her ruling earlier than June 4, she would communicate unto the parties.

Her decision to adjourn the case till to June 4 left all the suspects dejected while their relatives who had come to court hoping that the suspects would be granted bail could not hide their disappointment.

The wife of one of the suspects, Jibo Mohammed, who is also the deputy chairman of House Committee on Power, broke down in tears when her husband was being driven to Kuje prison. With her baby in her hand, she wept uncontrollably.

Opposing the bail applications, the EFCC’s lawyer, Obla, said that the evidence against the suspects amounted to about 513 pages.

He said, “The cheques used in effecting the withdrawals are serially displayed.

“Statements of witnesses show the meetings between the accused persons.”

He also argued that most of the offences for which the accused were charged were economic and financial crimes, and abuse of office which were species or derivatives of corruption.

Obla told the court that there was a high tendency that the accused would tamper with investigations.

According to him, the commission is still investigating other offences that have been committed by the suspects and that to release them on bail means that they will stifle further investigation.

The President and the cartel within

By Azubuike Ishiekwene, azubuikeishiekwe@yahoo.com
Published: Tuesday, 19 May 2009

My heart went out to President Umaru Yar’Adua on Wednesday as he signalled the unofficial launch of his second term campaign by addressing four messy issues: Uwais report; Ekiti rerun; Halliburton; and petrol scarcity. On all four issues, he sounded genuinely concerned, even passionate. Yet Yar’Adua, being Yar’Adua, he not only pretended that he didn’t know where the problems really lie, he failed to say anything new about how his government will provide solutions.

I will deal with petrol scarcity here, because I fear that I may be sounding like a broken record on the other three issues. Also, since the President said that the petrol racket was the bastion of the country’s greatest institutional corruption, the issue deserves special attention. In his first address to the State House press corps since he assumed office two years ago, Yar’Adua said an unnamed mafia had persistently sabotaged government’s efforts to deregulate the downstream sector of the oil industry for the past several years. The result of this unwholesome mafia activity, according to him, is a distortion of the supply chain. And now, for the past nearly one month, the streets of the world’s sixth largest exporter of crude oil have been cluttered with embarrassing fuel lines, which threaten to spill into Aso Rock.

Did I say the President was concerned, but yet pretended not to know where the problem lies? That’s right. It’s not enough to put the blame on a faceless mafia or to promise to restore supply in two weeks. If the Yar’Adua government is really serious about fighting corruption and claims to have finally identified the country’s corruption headquarters, saying so and restoring fuel supply won’t do. The government should smash the nest of corrupters, round them up, and prosecute them.

But it can’t – or more correctly – it won’t. What do I mean? The day after the President’s holy rage against the mafia, the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Rilwanu Lukman, echoed him. He canvassed the virtues of deregulation and the need for the NNPC to throw open its fuel import license process to all qualified comers. I nearly doffed my hat for him until I reminded myself that this same angel of light was at the heart of a January 25 story by Next on Sunday, in which he was accused of a stunning conflict of interest in some oil companies that may well be NNPC’s present or future customers. How Yar’Adua could ignore the report and appoint a man with one leg actively in oil business as his minister of petroleum resources is difficult to understand. But that’s how mafias are made and preserved. The most entrenched mafias worldwide have one leg in government, and one leg out.

NNPC’s current procedure for awarding fuel import license is a mafia breeder. Until the country’s four refineries were wilfully destroyed, the government sold nearly 400,000 barrels of oil daily to NNPC at a preferential price for refining to supplement local demand. As long as the refineries were running, there was very little problem. To pave the way for the fuel import mafia, however, the refineries were destroyed, and large volumes of the crude oil which the government sold to the NNPC at a preferential rate were diverted to the black market. The government was later forced to cancel the preferential allocation. But heads or tails, the NNPC would always win. With the refineries comatose and preferential allocation stopped, a new dispensation began, with the NNPC retaining the right to import 60 per cent of the local petrol requirement – a right which is now outsourced to third parties.

The bidding process for a license to import fuel for NNPC’s subsidiary, PPMC, is advertised; so it looks transparent. But a source told me on Saturday that, “it’s the sort of transparency that has produced virtually the same inefficient result for nearly one decade.” The major importers have remained: Tri Quest, Zenon, Sahara Energy, Ocean and Oil, and Vitol. These NNPC contractors are often mobilised, and are entitled to between 10 and 15 per cent margin of profit in addition to demurrage and any other importation costs they may incur.

On the other hand, the independent marketers who source funds at market rate and who provide 40 per cent of the imports are paid the difference between the landing cost of the product and the pump price from the Petroleum Support Fund. Except for those who have chosen to turn a blind eye, it’s not difficult to see that the wormwood is inside the wood. Yet, the Yar’Adua government either pretends that it can’t figure out where the mafia is or that it can moan its way out of trouble.

Deregulation is certainly the right way forward – that is, privatise the refineries; allow all who wish to import fuel to do so; remove arbitrary price caps; and set up appropriate regulatory framework for the industry. But curiously, the chief advocates of deregulation continue to foster the status quo. The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Odein Ajumogobia, the Presidential Adviser on Petroleum Matters, Emmanuel Egboga, for example, visited some private depots in Lagos on Friday, obviously in pursuit of the President’s promise to clear the petrol lines in two weeks.

But surely, Ajumogobia and Egboga must know by now that they’re chasing shadows. The problem has never really been discharging petrol at the jetties in Lagos, even though overall supply has been hampered by corruption and incompetence at the government-owned jetties. The problem has been how to move supplies up country – or wherever there is the demand – in the face of sabotaged and or obsolete pipelines and bad roads. With the huge pot of money available at the Petroleum Equalisation Fund, contractors simply divert supplies wherever it is profitable to do so. They later forge documents to claim bridging costs, when they have, in fact, bridged nothing.

Government continues to pay for services not rendered because of the political objective that petrol must sell at a uniform price across the country, in defiance of common sense. A source at the PEF told me last week that the Fund set aside N35bn as “bridging cost” for 2008, and had only paid out N17bn with the balance, mostly bogus claims, yet to be reconciled.

The truth is that the whole corrupt chain remains an essential part of government’s war chest of patronage – to slay the beast is to drive a nail in the government’s own artery. Does the government have the will to do it?

Members of Nigerian National Assembly charged with Fraud

Members of the Nigerian National Assembly in charge of investigating the country's electricity crisis have been charged with fraud.

Four MPs and six officials denied siphoning off $42m of public funds in a hearing that stretched over two days.

Each of the defendants had to rise 130 times to answer "not guilty".

The MPs had looked into why there was so little to show for the $16bn (£11bn) of investment in the power sector under former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

Their report implicated the ex-president, but a second panel set up to look at their findings recently cleared him and others in charge of power generation between 1999 and 2007 of the allegations.

NIGERIA ELECTRICITY FACTS
# Currently generates less than 1,000MW down from 3,500MW in 2008
# Nigeria wants to generate 6,000MW by the end of 2009
# In 12 years it wants to be able to generate 20,000MW
# Would need 100,000MW to become an industrialised economy, according to the ex-president
# Six power stations begun under the last administration have not been completed
# $16bn has so far been spent on the power sector since 1999

Senator Nicholas Ugbade - chairman of Senate Committee on Power - his House of Representatives counterpart Ndudi Elumelu, two other MPs and six government officials are accused of taking money from the Central Bank meant for local power projects.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) says that in December 2008, just after the MPs concluded their investigation into the power sector, they funnelled the cash into a range of front companies.

They deny the charges.

At the time of the investigation some commentators said it was part of a series of probes into the recently retired President Obasanjo which amounted to a "witch hunt".

But the probe painted a damning picture of the country's management of electricity generation over the last 10 years.

Experts testified to the committee that expensive turbines were rotting in Nigerian ports because the people who ordered them had no way of transporting the heavy equipment to the site of the power station.

The committee heard that other turbines were installed, but no-one had planned how they would be fuelled with gas as the country had sold all its supply for the next 16 years to international oil and gas companies.

The committee also uncovered several shady deals between high-ranking politicians and private companies where they failed to build contracted power stations.

'Never seen light'

But local media has reported that the panel reviewing that investigation concluded there was no money missing, as the Central Bank still held letters of credit meant for the contracts.

The second report, yet to be made public or debated by the House of Assembly, accuses the authors of the previous investigation of holding "personal vendettas" against the former president.

Nigeria generates less than 1,000 megawatts (MW) for a population of 140 million.

In large cities blackouts are a daily occurrence, and some areas have "never seen light" as people say in Nigerian pidgin.

Those who can afford it rely on generators.

Large scale business and industry in the country is almost impossible because of the power generation problem, correspondents say.

10,000 Ghost Workers on Customs Payroll

Jacob Buba Gyang


‘10,000 Ghost Workers on Customs Payroll’
From Onwuka Nzeshi in Abuja, 05.18.2009

The House of Representatives Committee on Customs and Excise has stumbled on another startling revelation in the ongoing probe of the inefficiency and alleged corruption in the system.
According to its finding, about 50 per cent of the 20,000 workforce in the Nigeria Customs Service under the regime of the immediate past Comptroller General of Customs, Jacob Buba Gyang, were ghost workers.
This was the submission of Business Ventures Watch, one of the numerous organisations giving testimonies at the public hearing. Business Ventures Watch, represented by Mr. Kola Shola, said Gyang maintained an overhead budget based on a staff strength of 20,000 when the Service had only 10,000 workforce even as at April 2008.
It was also alleged that the Nigeria Customs Service during the period under review was involved in some illegal deals including the importation and clearance of contrabands and fire arms into the country.
In a sworn affidavit with several annexures in support of the allegations, Shola said that the Customs Service apart from awarding several fictitious and over-bloated contracts also paid the sum of N5.4billion as consultancy fee for project supervision contrary to Federal Government’s policy guidelines.

Also five different contracts worth over a hundred million naira were awarded by the service for the supply of four Toyota Jeeps and three sound proof generators contrary to the directive of the Board of the Nigeria Customs Service and Federal Government’s Financial Regulation No. 2909(ii) and 2910 and Section 19(a) and 22(3) of the Public Procurement Act 2007.
The contracts include the supply of two Toyota Lexus Jeep 2007 Model LX470 with full options and back up spare parts at N42,900,000.00; two Toyota Prado Jeep 2007 Model GX with spare parts back up at the cost of N26,340,000.00; one 250KVA Perkins sound proof generator for Customs Office at Onne , Port Harcourt, at the cost of N13,354,550.64; one 100KVA Perkins sound proof generator for Comptroller General of Customs Guest House, Wuse at the cost of N8,980,700.00 and one 100KVA Perkins sound proof generator to Customs Office Bauchi at the cost of N8,980,500.00 only.
The Nigeria Customs Service Board had at its 20th regular meeting held on Tuesday October 10, 2006 queried the award of the said contracts without following the due process of passing through the Finance and General Purposes Committee of the Board. Each of the five contracts was above the sum of one million naira and therefore required the approval of the customs board. The testimonies and affidavits have since been admitted in evidence pending the appearance of the former Comptroller General of Nigeria Customs who was said to have authorised the transactions during his stewardship at the Nigeria Customs Service.

Halliburton: Why We Can’t Disclose Suspects Now, Says Presidency •

Halliburton: Why We Can’t Disclose Suspects Now, Says Presidency
•Yar’Adua sad over rural electrification scandal
From Ike Abonyi in Abuja, 05.17.2009

Nigerians anxious to see the Federal Gover-nment unveil the identity of officials behind the Halliburton bribery scandal may have to wait a bit longer as the Presidency at the weekend said records of the transactions need expert decoding and high level intelligence work.
Special Adviser to the President on Media and Communication, Mr. Olusegun Adeniyi, yesterday told THISDAY that the Halliburton case was so damming that Yar’Adua does not want to play politics with it but to follow the process and produce watertight evidence against suspects before bringing them to the public.
The Presidential spokes-man said: “Perhaps, if Yar’Adua was another person, he could have used the Halliburton scandal to make a public show about fighting corruption, and probably grandstand but at the end, such would achieve nothing. From the little I know about the Halliburton scandal, it is a potent political weapon but that is not Yar’Adua’s way. He wants to ensure that justice is done in this case and that includes ensuring that innocent people are not smeared in the process of bringing the perpetrators of the crime to justice and that takes time and meticulous efforts”, he said.
Adeniyi further said most of the transactions on the Halliburton case was done in coded language and would require thorough intelligence work to get out names of those involved.
“As fascinating as the tales in this file are, you do not find a single name of any Nigerian official mentioned there. What you find are coded names like Contractor A, Consultant B, Madeira Company 1 and so on and so forth. And even in areas dealing with the sharing of loot, names are not mentioned, what you have are phrases like top officials of the executive branch. Let me read some sections to you so you can understand the dilemma that led to setting up of the Okiro Panel now yielding results:
“Stanley and his co-conspirators agreed that Joint Venture would hire Consulting Company A to pay bribes to high-level Nigerian government officials, including top-level executive branch officials, and Consulting Company B to pay bribes to lower level Nigerian government officials, including employees of Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) Ltd, in exchange for the officials’ assistance in obtaining and retaining contracts to build the Bonny Island Project. Stanley and his co-conspirators caused Madeira Company 3 to execute consulting contracts with Consulting Company A and Consulting Company B providing for the payment of tens of millions of dollars in consulting fees in exchange for vaguely described marketing and advisory services, when in fact the primary purpose of the contracts was to facilitate the payment of bribes to Nigerian government officials.
“Prior to NLNG’s award to Joint Venture of the various EPC contracts, Stanley and other co-conspirators met with three successive holders of a top-level office in the executive branch of the Government of Nigeria and negotiated with the office holders’ representatives regarding the amount of the bribes that Joint Venture would pay to the Nigerian government officials. Stanley and his co-conspirators caused wire transfers totalling approximately $132 million from Madeira Company 3’s bank account in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, to bank accounts in New York, to be further credited to bank accounts in Switzerland and Monaco controlled by Consultant A for Consultant A to use to bribe Nigerian government officials. Stanley and his co-conspirators caused wire transfers totalling over $50 million from Madeira Company 3’s bank account in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, to Consulting Company B’s bank account in Japan for Consulting Company B to use to bribe Nigerian government officials.”
Adeniyi also said that it was this dilemma that made Yar’Adua to set up the Okiro panel which has been decoding the names and making some arrests.
He wondered how anyone can identify who got what under such coded disclosures like:
“On or about November 2, 1994, Consultant A told Salesperson A that he had spoken with a senior official of the Ministry of Petroleum, that Consultant A’s fee would be $60 million, that the first top-level executive branch official of the Government of Nigeria would get $40-45 million of the fee, that other Nigerian government officials would get $15-20 million of that fee, and that there would be a meeting between Stanley and the first top-level Nigerian executive branch official before any written agreement between Joint Venture and Consultant A. On or about November 30, 1994, Stanley and other co-conspirators met in Abuja, Nigeria, with the first top-level executive branch official of the Government of Nigeria to verify that the official was satisfied with Joint Venture using Consultant A as its agent and to confirm that the official wanted Joint Venture to negotiate with the senior official of the Ministry of Petroleum the bribes to Nigerian government officials. On or about March 20, 1995, Madeira Company 3 entered into an agreement with Consulting Company A providing, among other things, that Madeira Company 3 would pay $60 million to Consulting Company A if Joint Venture was awarded a contract, Trains 1 and 2 of the Bonny Island Project. On or about December 15, 1995, Madeira Company 3 wire transferred $1542 million to Consulting Company A, via a correspondent bank account in New York, New York, in payment of Consulting Company A’s first invoice under the consulting agreement for Trains 1 and 2. On or about April 9, 1996, Madeira Company 3 entered into an agreement with Consulting Company B whereby it agreed to pay Consulting Company B $29 million for assisting Joint Venture in winning the contract to build Trains 1 and 2 of the Bonny Island Project.”
He said that the Okiro panel is aimed at helping Government know the actual people involved, who took what amount, when and how.
He disclosed that because nothing significant can be achieved without the cooperation of USA, France, UK and Switzerland, the Minister of Justice and Attorney General has been on top of it trying to get the entire necessary documents from these countries.
On the scandal rocking the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) now before the court, the Presidential spokesman said Yar’Adua was saddened by the revelation especially with the involvement of members of the National Assembly. He wondered how the suspects would be able to explain what happened given the revelations on ground.
“I don’t know how the suspects will explain what they did. In one day on December 17 last year, a total of 158 contracts were awarded mainly to unregistered companies and without following any due process.
“Thirteen days later on December 30, a sum, totaling about N5.2billion was paid with the cheques broken into two installments of 15 per cent and 85 per cent. Everything about that transaction smells corruption. You find a situation where in one day, a young girl signed contract documents and collected cheques for hundreds of millions of naira on behalf of nine different companies, which have the same address, and the same GSM number on their letter headed papers,” he further explained.
When asked if the President’s press conference last Tuesday was the beginning of a new spirit in the fight against corruption, Adeniyi said: “Nothing has changed. Yar’Adua remains true to his conviction that the best way to fight corruption is to use the law rather than drama. But unfortunately, what some Nigerians want is entertainment. I am sure if the President gets the security agencies to arrest some of his former governor-colleagues, or perhaps even some of the serving ones using subterfuge, even when there are no evidence that can stand up in the court of law, he will be applauded as fighting corruption.
“You see, many people talk about the former governors but when you look at the quantum of money at the federal level, it is much more than that of the entire 36 states combined yet nobody has looked at what happens with that money.
“For example, I recall the money allegedly misappropriated by Mr. Joshua Dariye that led to his arrest and subsequent kangaroo impeachment is about N800 million from the ecological fund most of which as it even came out then were allegedly shared with some party big wigs in Abuja at that time. We all know what happened to Dariye. “Now, compare that situation with the recent revelations from the Rural Electrification Agency alone and you will see the wisdom of Yar’Adua’s approach that charity should begin at home. When you also consider the fact that Halliburton, Siemens and all those other scandal were at the federal level yet nobody was brought to book, you must understand where fighting corruption should really begin.”
Adeniyi also said the disposition of Yar’Adua is that: “if you begin by beaming the searchlight on federal government, it will be easier for the EFCC to go to the states rather than adopt the approach where governors were targeted, and selectively too, while officials of the federal government could sit atop monumental corruption without any questions asked of them.
“It is not that I am defending corruption at state level or making a case for former governors but I fail to accept that corrupt practices are restricted to state governors. That is not correct. In any case, the philosophy of Yar’Adua is that prevention is better than cure.
“For instance, it is so difficult now for officials to even try the kind of perfidy we saw at the Rural Electrification Agency with the e-Payment introduced with effect from January this year. Now, it is easy to follow the money trail. What triggered this whole investigation in the first place was movement of money in January after the transaction was concluded on December 30 last year.
“ Yar’Adua doesn’t believe corruption should be glamorised, he believes in fighting it. I think it is a matter of style because EFCC knows that they cannot publicly denounce anybody who has allegations of corruption against him or her. It is the court that can do that so their job is to look for watertight evidence that can ensure conviction rather than criminalise people on the pages of newspaper”, he said.
He explained that President Yar Adua’s continuous charge to the EFCC and other agencies is that they should do their work like normal routine exercise and he doesn’t want to take credit for what they are doing. ‘The beauty of his style is that nobody can ever accuse him of political persecution if he falls foul of the law and is apprehended. It will then be the law versus the individual concerned. That is the way it should be”, Adeniyi said.

Looters Dream And Delight::Abuja’s 10-lane Road Project To Gulp N257bn

Abuja’s 10-Lane Road Project to Gulp N257bn - Thisday

May 15, 2009 by bunmi

The Abuja Airport Express-way project embarked upon by the Federal Government will cost N257 billion even as President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua said yesterday that the establishment of the Infra-structure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) by the Federal Govern-ment was a demonstration of its commitment to providing infrastructure in line with the needs of a modern economy.

Yar’Adua disclosed this in Abuja at the official ground breaking ceremony for the commencement of works on the Airport Expressway and Outer Northern Expressway being constructed by the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FC-TA).

The project involves the expansion of the expressways to 10 lanes respectively and the rehabilitation of the existing expressways.

He described the project as “another bold step in our march towards vision 20-2020, for which the quality of infrastructure will be one of the critical elements for economic growth and prosperity.”

He explained that the two roads which currently have only four lanes each were conceived to be 10-lane expressways in the Abuja master plan.

‘It is in recognition of the huge capital outlay involved in such projects that the Federal Government decided to make full use of the innovation, enterprise and management efficiency of the private sector in improving the road network and in providing better value for money for taxpayers and road users.

Yar’Adua also explained that the establishment of the ICRC as a regulatory framework is to provide a stable policy regime which is vital to achieving that quality of infrastructure needed to spur growth in our country and help enhance transparency, and promote efficiency.

He said funding for the project came under the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) mode of procurement while noting that the FCTA will provide 40 percent of the funding while the contractors will source for the remaining 60 percent payment for which will only be made after completion of the projects.

In his speech at the occasion, FCT Minister, Senator Muhammad Adamu Aliero, recalled that on assumption of office last December, the chaotic traffic situation on the Airport and Kubwa roads had already reached an alarming proportion.

“This prompted us to immediately endorse and support the previous and continuous effort geared towards their expansion and rehabilitation in accordance with the Abuja Master Plan,” he said.

Aliero disclosed that the total cost of the project is N257 billion and said that through rigorous and transparent procurement process, three well tested and competent companies emerged as the winning contractors for the projects. Messrs Julius Berger, he explained, will execute the two lots of the Airport Expressway project, while Messrs Dantata and Sawoe and Messrs CGC Nigeria Limited, will execute Lot I and Lot II of the Outer Northern Expressway (Kubwa Expressway) projects, respectively.

Aliero, who claimed that the project is the first of its kind in this part of the continent, also disclosed that the contracts also provide for the construction of interchange bridges. These bridges will be constructed around the Kubwa, Dutse/Bwari, Katampe Extension and Barracks/IBB Golf Course Junctions, along the Outer Northern Expressway, as well as around the Kuje and Lugbe Junctions along the Airport Expressways.

Akwa Ibom State Governor beset by Corruption and Patronage

By http://www.huhuonline.com
Nigeria News



Akwa Ibom State Governor beset by Corruption and Patronage
By http://www.huhuonline.com
Nigeria News | 17 hours ago

Critics of Akwa Ibom State Governor, Barrister Godswill Akpabio, who have described his mantra of transparency and accountability as a joke recently received extra ammunition from a very unlikely source; the United States embassy.

American Embassy officials, Huhuonline.com has learnt, contacted the EFCC in connection with a personal bank account statement presented for visa purposes by a brother cum aide to Governor Akpabio. The bank statement containing in excess of N 1billion was presented by Barrister Ibanga Akpabio who is also the Secretary of the ruling PDP in Akwa Ibom State. He was seeking a visa to travel to Houston, United States to attend the Baptism and naming ceremony of his new baby boy named David.

Barrister Ibanga, Huhuonline.com has also learnt from close family sources was living in Ikot Ekpene but has now relocated his family to the United States, where he has reportedly bought a house in Houston and frequents there. Neither the EFCC nor the ICPC has moved to question Governor Akpabio or his brother about his new-found wealth.

But observers see the disclosure, as a refreshing pail of water on the face of the feel-good hypocrisy unleashed by Governor Akpabio and his circle of sycophants, including his Information Commissioner, who, with the sure-footedness of an official Inquisitor, has launched a public relations offensive against the Governor's critics, describing them as “pens for hire” out to bring down the Governor.The Information Commissioner had through media advertorials lampooned critics of Akwa Ibom government, whom he defenestrated as “professional petition writers” and “Media Contractors in Lagos and Abuja,” saying they are all “losers” out to stir rancor and confusion in the State.

But one of the Governor Akpabio “detractors” told Huhuonline.com that the Akwa Ibom State Government is merely engaged in the ostrich joke of hiding the head while the body is uncovered. He accused Governor Akpabio of short-changing the people of Akwa Ibom State with empty platitudes, while enriching himself and his small coterie of friends.

Among the long list of questionable procurement policies and corrupt practices by the Akwa Ibom State government, Huhuonline.com learnt that public contracts is one area where Governor Akpabio has thrown caution to the winds, engaging in reckless squandermania, doling out juicy contracts to his friends and family members, operating shell schemes and ghost companies. A couple of examples drive home the point.

Most notable is the cost of tarring a kilometer of road in the State. Whereas the Federal East-West road projects cost N650 million per kilometer of tarred road, in Akwa Ibom, the official cost is N1 Billion per kilometer. To which could be added the Ibom Tropicana Center which has been the cause of much controversy and anger. Eye-brows were raised when the cost of the Ibom Tropicana Center was given as N33 billion, whereas a similar project, the Abuja Water Parks Island – a private initiative – cost far below N7 billion.

v Governor Akpabio has yet to explain the circumstances under which the 2-km Cardinal Ekandem Road in Ikot Ekpene; originally awarded to an indigenous contractor – Tiken Nigeria Ltd by the previous administration for N217 million was cancelled and awarded to a Lebanese Company – Semco Nigeria Ltd at a whooping cost of N600 million.

The Governor has also been taken to task over the astronomical cost of airport construction in Akwa Ibom State, estimated at N47 billion, whereas similar construction in Delta and Anambra States costs N7 billion and N25 billion respectively. In another instance, a Government Housing project, initially estimated at N6.5 billion is now the subject of additional funding. Critics are pointing to the fact that the advertorials calling for bids states explicitly that contractors that have not handled contracts above N2 billion need not apply, thereby automatically excluding indigenous contractors.

The Governor is also accused of operating a network of ethnic-inspired clientelism with his close friends and family members fronting for foreign companies who are reportedly milking the state dry. Questions have been asked but the Akwa Ibom administration has yet to provide answers over the true ownership of companies such as Diamond Engineering Nigeria Ltd; Emem & Sons Nigeria Ltd and Sinoeng Nigeria Ltd.

Governor Akpabio is amongst those clamoring for the death penalty to kidnappers who demand bowel-shattering ransoms from their victims. Observers have been wondering why the Governor has kept mute over the amount of ransom he paid to kidnappers for the release of his home local government chairman.

In the face of all these criticisms, Governor Akpabio has remained unperturbed, dismissing the criticisms as the handiwork of detractors and his political opponents who are jealous of his success in the state of Akwa Ibom. His media blitz against the so-called “media contractors” raises more questions as to why a Governor who claims to have achieved so much for the State should be resorting to propaganda and sophistry to sell his record of accomplishments to the public.

Governor Akpabio's supporters blame his political opponents and accuse the media of biased and unfair treatment and of targeting the Governor's family, saying this amounted to a blow below the belt. Laughing off the accusation, one such critic told Huhuonline.com that the problem of Governor Akpabio is that he always wears his belt on his forehead so that wherever you hit him was below the belt! And his traducers appear only too eager to deliver killer punches below the belt. And it couldn't be otherwise for the head of a government with so many challenges!

Only In Lawless Nigeria::150 Overtime containers allegedly missing

150 Overtime containers allegedly missing
By Andrew Airahuobhor, Correspondent, Lagos

There are strong indications that some Nigerians may have formed themselves into a cartel for auctioning overtime cargo transferred to Ikorodu Lighter Terminal, which the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) recently handed over to the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS).
More than 100 containers have allegedly disappeared from the almost 1,000 overtime containers that were transferred to the terminal in February, in the peak of the congestion that bedeviled Lagos seaports.

Investigation also revealed that some containers transferred to the terminal were allegedly forced open by customs officers in conjunction with the auction cartel, and if found to contain vehicles, it will be auctioned at a very ridiculous price.

Daily Independent gathered that some group of 'touts,' allegedly fronting for some customs comptrollers and lawmakers in Abuja, gather around the terminal to monitor the containers being transferred there.

These comptrollers and lawmakers are said to be tipping some 'touts' who loiter the terminal to identify the containers with valuable goods worth several millions of Naira. This is apparently to mark them for auction.

Sapid Bonded Terminal, a service provider in the terminal is even confused at the situation as it said to be receiving an average of 40 allocation papers daily from Abuja.

At the peak of congestion at the Lagos ports, the NPA was directed to oversee the transfer of containers that have stayed more than 90 days in the ports to Ikorodu.

This was done to create space at the ports, which was having lots of overtime containers.

Almost a thousand containers were transferred to Ikorodu before another 2,000 were slated to be transferred to Onne port in Rivers State as Ikorodu could no longer hold more containers because of the topography, which cannot hold heavy equipment.

The federal government had also directed that owners of the containers could go ahead with payment of duty and the necessary documentation in order to clear their consignments from Ikorodu.

But some of the agents got to Ikorodu to discover that the same container on which they have paid duty had been allocated to another person in the name of auction.

The national presidential liaison officer of the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), Pius Ogudo, in a petition he wrote to NAGAFF president, said that many people are gathered at the terminal, looking for auction containers to buy, which are usually sold at very ridiculous prices.

Ogudo, who is a customs agent, wondered why Sapid should have more than 400 auction papers ready for delivery, when customs have not commenced auctioning process.

According to him, his container, which has two Peugeot 207 cars, was allocated to an unknown person before he could present evidence for payment of duty.

Daily Independent contacted the general manager, Western Port Operations, of NPA, Mohammed Bulangu, who supervised the transfer of overtime containers to Ikorodu in February, on the issue, and he pointed out that NPA was no longer in charge of Ikorodu terminal.

According to him, NPA only got involved in the transfer because of congestion, as part of measures taken to decongest the ports, noting that all the necessary documentation were done and after ensuring that the containers landed at the terminal, customs took over custody of them.

When contacted, Customs Area Controller of ILT, Comptroller O. Olojo denied knowledge of any missing container claiming that he releases only containers that are duly documented.

"Thank you for the information. You can go ahead and publish anything, there are no containers disappearing here, I release containers that are duly documented," Olojo told Daily Independent on telephone Thursday.

When asked why containers are auctioned before customs headquarters commenced process of auctioning, he said, "I don't know anything about auction. Any container that is auctioned is auctioned. I don't know about that."

Efforts to contact the ACG headquarters proved abortive as he was said to be in a meeting.

Stealing Our Future::N26.6bn fund: EFCC swoops on vice chancellors, others

N26.6bn fund: EFCC swoops on vice chancellors, others

ERASMUS ALANEME, Abuja

Following complaints from the management of the Education Trust Fund (ETF) over alleged inability of vice chancellors, rectors and provosts from over 70 tertiary institutions to account for intervention fund disbursed to them, operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) will soon swoop on the affected institutions.

Daily Champion gathered that commissioners of education from 17 states as well as State Universal Basic Education Boards (SUBEBs) chairmen from 21 states will also face the music when the anti-graft agency spreads its net to gather those sabotaging the development effort of government in the education sector.

Already, the ETF had published the list of affected universities, polytechnics, colleges of education, monothechnics, state ministries of education as well SUBEBS bringing the number of those affected to about 120.

A dependable source in the education sector who spoke to our reporter said that already, the EFCC chairman, Faida Waziri has been briefed about the problem and that she had promised to order for preliminary investigations into what actually happened to the funds released to those involved in the case initially.

The source told Daily Champion that the EFCC had promised that since the initial money was meant for specific projects, its operatives will visit the institutions, states ministries of education and SUBEB offices to determine whether such projects were executed as claimed.

The source said as at today, the cry of under-funding is clouding the actual problem in the education sector which is that of poor implementation and lack of transparency in the utilisation of money meant for the sector.

Confirming this to Daily Champion, President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) Bashir Babale, said aside the earlier promise by the EFCC boss to ensure that corruption is stamped out of all campuses, there are moves to commence the fight totally in the sector.

Babale said as from next week, operatives of the EFCC will commence visitations to Nigerian university campuses nationwide to kick- start the ‘Zero Tolerance of Corruption on Campuses’ adding that the leadership of the student body will meet with EFCC officials early next week.

Also, spokesperson for the EFCC, Femi Babafemi confirmed to Daily Champion that the anti-graft body is working with ETF on the issue of disbursed funds and its utilisation.

"I know we are working with the ETF on disbursed funds. It was the issue of ETF funds that led to the arrest of the officials of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC)," he said.

It would be recalled that the officials of UBEC are being detained by the EFCC for collecting N850 million from the ETF for the importation of plastic chairs and desks out of N1.7 billion. But the utilisation of the money was said not to have followed due process.

Some of the affected universities include, Federal University of Technology Owerri (FUTO), Federal University of Technology Minna, Federal University of Technology, Yola, University of Abuja (UNIABUJA), University of Ilorin (UNILORIN), University of Port-Harcourt (UNIPORT), University of Uyo (UNIUYO), University of Jos (UNIJOS), University of Lagos (UNILAG), University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka (NAU), Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University (ATBU) Bauchi, Usman Danfodio University, Sokoto, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike and Federal University of Petroleum Resources, Effurun-Delta State.

Others are Delta State University, (Delsu) Abraka, Ebonyi State University, (EBSU) Ikwo, Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), Enugu, Imo State University (IMSU), Kano State University of Technology (KASUT), Wudil, Lagos State University (LASU), Ojo, Niger State University, (NDU) Wilberforce Island, Rivers State University of Science and Technology (RSUST), Port-Harcourt and Ondo State University, (OSU) Akungba Akoko.

The above institutions have a total of N6.343billion funds with the ETF which they are yet to access because of their inability to account for the money they collected before now.

For the polytechnics, Kaduna Polytechnics, Federal Polytechnic Bauchi, Adamawa State Polytechnic, Yola, Yaba College of Technology, Federal Polytechnic Ede, Federal Polytechnic, Offa among others have N2.884 billion with the ETF.

Seventeen state ministries of education are also involved in the problem as they are yet to access over N2.865billion as a result of their inability to account for earlier funds disbursed to them.

The states are Anambra, Bauchi, Bayelsa, Borno, Cross River, Ebonyi, Edo, Ekiti, Imo, Kano, Kwara, Nassarawa, Ondo, Osun, Plateau, Zamfara and Kogi.

The SUBEBs that are to access over N8.898billion include Abia, Akwa-Ibom, Anambra, Bayelsa, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Enugu, Imo, Kano, Kwara, Lagos, Niger, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Rivers, and Zamfara.

In addition, 11 Monotechnics are yet to access N368.530million while 14 Colleges of Education have over N1.272billion to collect.

It will be recalled that the Executive Secretary of the ETF, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu had earlier lamented the problem of unaccountability in the use of funds disbursed by the ETF as well as the huge amount yet to be accessed by the benefiting institutions.

Yakubu had in a statement said: "The ETF has accumulated un-accessed funds of N22.6billion for various beneficiaries (tertiary institutions, state ministries of education and State Universal Basic Education Boards) across the country from allocations made from year 2000 to 2008.

"This situation is no longer acceptable as the ETF is not a banker for the education system but a funding agency fro the transformation of the sector through project management. The Fund will no longer tolerate a huge profile of allocated but un-accessed funds, more so when our educational institutions are in dire need of funding" he added.

Photo file
EFCC Chairman, Mrs. Farida Waziri

N5bn REA scam: Projects inserted in amended 2008 budget
By Chiawo Nwankwo and Olufemi Adeosun, Abuja
Published: Thursday, 14 May 2009
Fresh facts that emerged on Wednesday indicated that the N5.2bn projects scam in the Rural Electrification Agency, which led to the arrest of some ministry officials and lawmakers in the National Assembly occured during the amendment of the 2008 budget.
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Photo file

EFCC Chairman, Mrs. Farida Waziri

Investigations by our correspondents also showed that the Financial Intelligence Unit of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission uncovered the fraud while monitoring huge financial transactions at some banks.

According to an EFCC source, the suspects used the opportunity presented by the supplementary budget proposals and subsequent debates at the parliament to insert the projects into the 2008 Appropriation Act.

He explained that the controversial contract comprised mainly solar panels and electricity grid extension projects.

But the projects were split into small units to ensure that the contracts did not go to the Federal Executive Council for approval.

According to existing rules guiding the award of contracts, a ministry is not empowered to approve any contract worth more than N50m.

Yar’Adua had submitted an amendment bill to the 2008 budget of N2.8tn to take care of some grey areas he raised after it was passed by the legislature.

He had noted that some details were lacking just as he considered the figure higher than normal.

However, the Head of Media and Publicity of the EFCC, Mr. Femi Babafemi, in an interview with one of our correspondents on Tuesday, disclosed that the FIU alert on huge transactions led to the discovery of the scam.

He said, “The FIU burst the scam, and when we moved in, we were able to trace the money in some accounts to have come from the REA and that was how the managing director and the permanent secretary of the ministry were arrested.

“From the statements we got from them, it became obvious that the lawmakers detained had some questions to answer over the matter.”

It was gathered from another source that shortly after the money for the contract was released, the REA Managing Director Mr. Sam Gapke, came under serious pressure for the contracts to be awarded between October and November last year.

Gapke, who was reportedly confused, complained to the permanent secretary, who allegedly cleared the fog for him.

However, it is not clear in the supplementary budget the projects directly linked to the scam, but under REA, capital projects are listed solar power projects and rural electrification projects.

Some solar-PV power supply and rural energy pilot projects said to be for poverty eradication are in nine locations in Kogi State and are worth N350m.

Another N350m was set aside for solar power supply projects for Onicha-Uku, Isele-Uku, Akwukwu Igbo, Ogwashi-Ukwu and Oko in Delta State.

A total of N160m of such projects broken into N40m each, are located in Niger State while a N100m project was to be cited in Bomadi/Patani in Delta State .

Ogun State also benefited with N540m projects. 10 of such projects are worth N450m.

A ministry under existing contract award guidelines, has N50m approval limit, while the Federal Executive Council approves contracts above N50m.

Besides, un-utilised N16.412, 030,961 for rural electricity projects in 2006, was part of the 2008 budget which covered all 36 states of the federation.

A total of 10 suspects are being detained over the N5.2bn scam, which include four lawmakers and six officials of the Ministry of Power, including its Permanent Secretary, Dr. Aliyu Abdullahi.

Suspects among the lawmakers are Senator Nicholas Ugbane, Chairman Senate Committee on Power, his counterpart in the House of Representatives, Mr. Ndudi Elumelu; Alhaji Mohammed Jibo and Mr. Paulinus Igwe.

The EFCC had on Tuesday filed a 156-count charge against the 10 suspects, who might be