When the now suspended Senator Abdul Ningi, representing the good people of Bauchi central senatorial district, Bauchli state, raised the alarm about the alleged monumental fraud concealed in the 2024 budget, not even he could believe that other northern senators under the Northern Senators Forum (NSF), which he led, would forsake him halfway through the struggle, but that’s exactly what happened. A deep look at the intriguing outcome of Senator Ningi’s lone battle may even suggest some sort of a setup, considering how swiftly senators of the NSF denounced him.
The circle of denouncement started on Sunday with Senators Titus Zam from Benue, Sunday Karimi from Kogi and Kaka Shehu from Borno state, before a statement signed by Senators Aminu Abass (PDP, Adamawa central), Ibrahim Bomai (APC, Yobe South), Abdulaziz Yar’adua (APC, Katsina central), Lawal Usman (PDP, Kaduna central), Isah Jibrin (APC, Kogi east), Diket Plang (APC, Plateau central) and Saliu Mustapha (APC, Kwara central). No part of this statement signed on behalf of other senators indicated whether it was the NSF which indeed contracted the firm that scrutinised the budget and found the gaps or whether it was Ningi’s plot all along.
The NSF, now led by Abdulaziz Yar’adua, was also silent on the meeting with Senate President Godswill Akpabio where it was said Akpabio was confronted with findings of the NSF and was reportedly bewildered. It was even reported that the senate president asked ranking senators like Ali Ndume (APC, Borno south) if he was aware of how the budget came to be so loaded with free floating provisions. One is then tempted to ask, if the NSF senators did not buy into Ningi’s initial claims, how come they agreed to accompany him to that face off with Akpabio?
From the sequence of events leading to Senator Ningi’s interview with BBC Hausa, it was clear that he believed he still had the backing of the NSF. This is because, the NSF’s faceoff with Akpabio took place on Thursday, March 7. It took Senators Zam, Karimi and co over three days to dissociate themselves from Senator Ningi’s interview with BBC Hausa. Clearly, this reeks of subterfuge. Members of the NSF have clearly forsaken Ningi, may be even set out to forsake him from the off. The problem with Ningi was that he kept faith with his NSF members until the very end.
Senator Opeyemi Bamidele’s shocking claims that Senator Ningi’s budget padding allegation is some sort of a South versus North faceoff orchestrated to unseat Akpabio when previous senate presidents of northern extraction had enjoyed peaceful reigns is evidence that Akpabio together with his southern senators were out to trivialise the issue.
Sadly, NSF members joined in condemning Senator Ningi for alleging that the 2024 budget had been loaded with fictitious or repeated projects, for which the amount budgeted for some constituency projects came up to a whopping N50 billion while his Bauchi central was given a meagre N1 billion.
From Senator Bamidele’s comments, it is clear that Abdul Ningi’s shedding of the senate leadership’s alleged secret was the highest crime a Nigerian politician can commit against the majority of ermm…very upright politicians that people the senate, many of whom, as we have seen, are not shy of resorting to cheap bigotry, religious or racial chicanery to get out of embarrassing situations. Contrary to the senate’s claim that Ningi’s allegation was unjustly bringing it to disrepute, the general belief among Nigerians is that the senate quickly wrapped up Ningi’s trial because he was unearthing disturbing facts that rubbished whatever honour the senate believes it had.
A Premium Times investigation did not only corroborate Ningi’s claims that over N54 billion worth of projects in the 2024 budget are without specific locations, but it also revealed even more startling specifics of the insertions. In one instance, Premium Times found that the senators duplicated same untraceable projects in two agencies or more. In one instance, the National Horticulture Research Institute, Ibadan and the Nigerian Institute of Oceanography and Marine Research had the same entry – contract description and amount, but vague location.
One of the most pungent revelations by the Premium Times report detailed how the N1.8 billion budget submitted by the president for National Centre for Agricultural Mechanisation was ballooned to N38.6 billion by the lawmakers. There is also the case of the National Agricultural Council of Nigeria which was originally allocated N2.7 billion by the president but ended up with N22.9 billion after the legislators added to it. Add this to the analysis made by Channels TV which shows that N82.5 billion was budgeted for 427 boreholes amounting to N197 million per borehole; and N212 billion for 1,1150 streetlights, amounting to N184 million per streetlight, and you just might get the true picture of the alleged monumental fraud in the 2024 budget as well as the real crime of Senator Ningi.
In truth, Senator Ningi was not really suspended by the senate, he was failed by the northern senators whom he thought he could count on; Ningi was disowned by the NSF. Unfortunately, the senators were not interested in the facts of the matter. They were rather more interested in silencing a recalcitrant senator, and that may be why they jettisoned the normal procedure of discipline to swifty condemn him to that three-month suspension, believing that it will do the magic. They seem to believe a swiftly served deterrent would warn other loud-mouthed senators plotting to toe the path of Ningi’s courageous adventure to snap out of their fantasies. But, Ningi has insisted that he will neither apologise nor retract his findings, showing the NSF and Akpabio that he is not your typical Nigerian politician.
The senate has made it clear that there is nothing to investigate, and that is unfortunate. The chairman of the senate committee on Media and Publicity, Senator Yemi Adaramodu, foreclosed that possibility. His claims that the exact amount alleged to have been padded into the 2024 budget was statutory transfers to first-line charge agencies of government not domiciled in the ministries appear to be the end of the matter as far as the Nigerian Senate is concerned. Therefore, Ningi, a victim of his honesty, has been hung out to dry.
But Nigerians want to see beyond Adaramodu’s dismissal, especially now that the senate spokesperson’s challenge to journalists to investigate the budget appears to be revealing facts that corroborate Ningi’s allegation. So, if Akpabio ever wants to restore the honour of the senate, he should void Ningi’s suspension and allow for an independent investigation of the matter, Anything short of this will be unjust and unacceptable.
As for the NSF senators, now under Abdulaziz Yar’adua, one wonders how they would look at their constituents and convince them that they sacrificed Ningi for some unexplained interest. Whatever the general belief becomes in the end, Senator Ningi has shown that he is not afraid to stand alone, to sacrifice himself for the people of Northern Nigeria and history will remember him proudly.
Anas writes from Kano.
