Friday Column by Engr. Abubakar A. Fari
Facts are sacred. They do not lie. Facts are open and clear. There is no chicanery with facts. The Oxford dictionary says facts are used to refer to a particular situation that exists. There is therefore no room to maneuver the facts. Like the sun rising in the horizon, the finger cannot hide it. But for man, he is given to not telling the facts if it does not favour him. Man is prone to evil unless the one who our Lord Allah (SWT) has mercy upon him. So man is given to accusing his opponents but does not like to be reminded about his tons of evil deeds. Our self assured OBJ in the study of human behaviour in society sees himself an African village daddy who, whatever he says, is fact and no one dares challenge him.
OBJ spent a whopping US Dollars 16.0 billion and the white master “Oyibo” took the lion share for the project execution, on power. But facts remain that no electric power to run homes, offices, factories, small businesses that OBJ was supposed to have delivered but they only exist in his phantom book. So from his book Buhari and the Nigerian engineers and technicians should go and generate electricity. Remember OBJ was advocating Juju to fight the super power. Now he has changed strategy, seeking Buhari to get hold of his book to deliver electric power. There is a new theory of compatible equations and compatibility in power generation postulated in the OBJ book. And OBJ claims to have studied a branch of engineering!
To OBJ how dare you pin point his faults, if you are not the late Former Head of State and the C in C Sani Abacha, the no nonsense Army General. He knows it all and in communication skills as one with the “Allness” syndrome disease which makes one believe he has all the answers on his finger tips and will not accept superior opinion and logic. When he bungles or involved in wrong-doings, the downside must accept. Not even his peers like the late Sunday Awoniyi and now Buhari as a former military Head of State and now a democratically elected President, OBJ will grandstand like a spoilt kid born with silver in his mouth which is not in his case.
Even though Buhari has better credentials in governance and uprightness in dealing with corruption head-on that Obasanjo merely paid lip-service to, Ironically, Abacha is laughing last with the way the large volume of petro-dollars that came the way of OBJ but in a mild way PMB says he has embezzled them. In the global circles more so in London, Washington, the leaders of Africa Union and Nigerians do not know OBJ as one who is straight but rather as one who superintended over US Dollars that had no material impact on the lives of Nigerians. OBJ is not one with zero tolerance for corruption but a “lion” in the jungle who must devour any animal that comes its way.
Imagine US Dollars 16 Billion sunk in power projects that do not exist except in the volumes of so-called OBJ books. Here OBJ, instead of giving facts is insulting the intelligence of Nigerians by saying go refer to “my book” to tell you where the electric power generation is. Haba old OBJ this is “spiritual corruption” that the gentleman Awoniyi accused you of, while Ghali Na’abba the former Speaker House of Representatives during your days condemned you as the “most corrupt Nigerian” to enter the black book of one kind leader in Nigeria. This statement of OBJ reminds me of one government official accused of not accounting for tractor procurement. Like OBJ he claimed it was purchased and in existance. So when asked to show the tractor he took the investigating Committee to a location supposedly the tractor was delivered. On getting to the place, it was not found. It did not exist as the facts revealed. His explanation was that the wind had blown the tractor to an unknown destination. So the power projects like this mystery tractor the wind has carried it into the OBJ books.
Such fairy tales are what, if OBJ were Japanese or Chinese confronted with these probes, will commit suicide for twisting facts without shame. In saner countries abuse of office and trust cannot be politicized or tribalised or religion used to pervert justice. In sane countries unaccounted US Dollars 16.0 billion equivalent to N 5.7 Trillion Naira cannot be a subject of joke or debate without forcing the officer to pay it back and given the unthinkable punishment to deter others. The manifestation of what Awoniyi and Na’abba declared on OBJ would seem beyond question. Economic crimes are not to be treated with kid gloves for OBJ did not treat others with kid gloves.
No Nigerian should be allowed to get away with injustice and abuse of trust. Not OBJ who had been charging the atmosphere for 8 years orchestrating “Abacha loot” in Nigeria, Washington and London at every slight opportunity. Why do the southerners believe in double standard of justice in Nigeria? They suppress justice when their own is involved and blow hot when the Muslim and especially Hausa –Fulani is involved in league.
One may for the sake of argument, forgive small faults of say of misapplication of US Dollars 160, 000.00 now which stands at N50.0 million. But to deceive the population with a case of N5.7 trillion is not acceptable under any circumstance. OBJ or any supporter cannot just dismiss such colossus amount as nothing. OBJ lacks positive credentials as a democrat. When the anti-democratic violations as a dictator manifested as charged by Buhari about the cases of 5 governors dismissed like labourers illegally by the instigation of OBJ, the news media did not raise any hysteria about doom coming Nigeria’s way.
Some concerned Nigerians are calling, rightly asking for justice to be done in respect of US Dollars 16.0 billion. It is not OBJ that is the target but accountability and so he could not stand above the law with respect to the abuse of office and public trust. OBJ at above 80 years should not take issues for granted as to see himself as being above the law and without limits to his conducts in dealing with authourity. That kind of confrontational attitude made Abacha deal with him squarely. Heavens did not fall with OBJ in prison and will not fall if he returns back to prison.
It is not too late for OBJ to come to his senses and allow the government to govern as he was allowed to govern albeit with injustice and accused as “spiritually corrupt” and as “the most corrupt Nigerian” and still was allowed to end 8 years which out of his double standards wanted to go for third term. In the 8 years, it is on record that OBJ did not use the resources at his disposal to better the lives of Nigerians. OBJ was more of a Mobutu type dictator with lack of vision but the desire for loyalty which gave licence to loyalists and his government not to account for the way not only power projects but “the missing NNPC”, proceeds “from the monetization sales”, the debtors in the “Ghana must go” to get what he wanted from the National Assembly which Ghali Na’abba can verify and which OBJ has not responded to date of Na’abbas accusation of corruption. If it is scratching my back and I scratch your back, OBJ did for others and vice versa for him. Certainly the APC government has the records at its disposal which OBJ knows and if not out of arrogance, why does he pretend it does not exist? Indeed, if the come comes to become, then he should not be allowed to remain above the law no matter the consequences.
