By Aminu Shehu Kainji
According to the online news medium, Premium Times, the World Bank has again asked for more time to release details of how the Nigerian government spent recovered Abacha loot. The online news medium reported that the bank’s assurance followed the concern expressed by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP). In its letter to the bank on February 5, the accountability watchdog said some major information it requested on how Abacha loot was spent was not satisfactorily provided. The secrecy surrounding the expenditure of the Abacha loot leaves many Nigerians dumbfounded.
The stubborn persistence of SERAP, an NGO, to seek answers to the questions about how the recovered Abacha loot was managed is becoming some kind of irritation to former President Obasano and his then Finance Minister, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. Obasanjo furiously declared that those asking him to account for the Abacha loot are “stupid.” But was his anger necessary, or diversionary? He didn’t have reasons to be angry because he must be willing to subject himself to the same accountability standard he introduced for the country while he was in power. He should not take it personally.
With the death of Abacha and the election of Obasanjo, one thought Nigeria would have no problem with corruption again. Soldiers were once perceived as the most corrupt, but this thinking is not consistent with the realities of our present democratic order.
It is ironic that the so-called democracy in Nigeria is producing more corruption than service delivery to citizens. The so-called popularly elected leaders are becoming billionaires overnight while the ordinary voters continue to be ravaged by poverty.
When he was elected in 1999, former President Obasanjo lamented the extent to which corruption had wrecked Nigeria and promised to tackle it decisively. In 2001, he introduced the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other offences Commission (ICPC).
Nigerians hailed the initiative as a welcome policy to fight corruption and bring development to Nigeria and improve the wellbeing of the ordinary citizens. Unfortunately, despite the introduction of the anti-graft agencies, the punishments for corruption have not been harsh enough to scare big thieves from ruining the nation’s economy. In fact, former Minister of Finance Okonjo-Iweala admitted that corruption was destroying the economy of the country. But then she forgot that fighting corruption goes beyond lamentation or lip-service. As long as there is impunity corruption will continue to thrive in Nigeria. Once government lacks the courage to fight corrupt people because they are well connected, it losses credibility in the eyes of the citizens about its seriousness to fight graft.
The recovery of the stolen billions by the late General Sani Abacha appeared to be the main preoccupation of the Obasanjo administration.
In fact, even the current administration is still talking about its efforts to recover the Abacha loot. The Swiss Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Haans Hodel, recently announced that his country had returned more than $700 million Abacha loot to Nigeria. Converted into naira, this heavy cash stands at N119 billion! This money is big enough to deal with the challenges of education,
healthcare, poverty and unemployment in Nigeria. Yet, Nigerians cannot say precisely where the recovered Abacha loot has been going all these years. Billions of dollars stolen by other Nigerian public officeholders are still stashed away in foreign banks. The government has not told us anything about the recovery of these billions besides Abacha’s. Why has it been that all the recovery efforts of looted funds are concentrated on the Abacha money?
Did corruption stop in Nigeria with the death of Abacha? According to the Washington-based Global Integrity Group, a corruption monitoring watchdog, $129 billion was stolen and illegally transferred to foreign banks in ten years under Nigeria’s democratic rule since 1999. Corruption continues unabated and there appears to be no real evidence that the government is enthusiastic about recovering billions stolen and kept abroad by other white collar criminals.
While there is no justification to defend the corruption under the Abacha regime, the perpetration of graft by governments that came after him is not defensible either. In fact, Nigerians should apologise to Abacha because of the hypocrisy of the anti-corruption crusaders that came after him.
Did corruption stop under Obasanjo?How many billions did his administration recover from other crooks apart from Abacha? Can Nigeria fight corruption with double standard?
In 1999, Obasanjo said Abacha had brought Nigeria to its knees because of corruption. And since then, has corruption stopped impeding the progress of Nigeria? This democracy has produced more corruption than ordinary Nigerians have ever known. Despite our return to democratic rule since 1999, our leaders are still not respected in the eyes of the international community. And corruption is the cause of this contempt towards our leaders.
We have had enough noise over the recovery of the Abacha loot. Nigerians still want to know why the billions being stolen and transferred abroad by corrupt officials in this democracy was not receiving attention by the Obasanjo administration. Obasanjo’s main interest in the entire efforts shows that loot recovery should begin and end with the repatriation of Abacha funds.
Kainji, an anti-corruption crusader, wrote from 62, Anguwar Dosa, Kaduna. Email: aminushehukj67@gmail.com