LET us discuss corruption today. I intend to focus on monetary and material corruption only at this time. This has become necessary as President Buhari, who made fighting corruption a key aspect of his war cry and mantra and got this engraved into APC’s manifesto, has finally retired to Daura. It is unarguable that, just like the mouthed phrase to justify incompetence by the ruling party in its early days when they used to talk glibly about ‘corruption fighting back’, the sad reality is that corruption, rather than abate, metastasized in the last eight years. Is it, I mean corruption, also retiring to Daura or Niger Republic? Or it has moved, as part of the handover processes, to a townhall, different from balablu bulaba?
That federal level malfeasance is not the main focus of my discourse today. It will be touched upon too as part of the general malaise that has afflicted the Nigerian polity and has almost become accepted by the political elite. At the federal level, we have had thefts, stupendous larceny and grand heists that turned the anti-corruption fight on its head. Remember the Pension Fund Scam whose perpetrator was said to have hosted our Federal officials in his Dubai hide-out and eventually got promoted while has chase and investigation were on? We know his prosecution has stalled and, as usual in our corruption-infested clime, the final outcome(s) are usually shrouded in secrecy and obscurantism.
There were also said to have been widespread use of ‘consultants’ who sometimes consulted on already resolved cases and were rewarded with humongous consultancy fees. It is alleged, that, for instance, that this was the way, some powerful political leaders creamed off a part of the recovered loots. I do not have proof of this alleged malfeasance, but the belief is commonplace. It is called ‘taking your share’. There is even another variant called ‘thief thiefing the thief’ whereby an law enforcement extorts an accused in order to prevent his prosecution and keep his investigation interminable till the regime expires and people forget.
This system tends to encourage big heists. That way, if the theft was 3 billion, then asking for a share of 5 hundred million is considered considerate and value for thievery money! Please note that I am using theft generically as some thefts are simply that while others are real corruption. Not all thefts are corruption, of course, but since we are dealing with larceny by public officials, these thefts can be called corruption interchangeably. Jonathan was right though. That not all thefts are corruption!
How do you regard Trader money, for instance? Our commonwealth funds disbursed under shady processes and based on political considerations especially deployed during election eves. I never saw one person who got this trader money in spite of the huge numbers of trading poor relations in various markets in my beloved Edo State! Osinbajo appeared not to have had Edo Traders at heart.
Even the acclaimed Oshio pikin could not influence the sharing to Edo. Or did he? Which of the markets? Which traders? Name them! If, as it seems, the money was targeted only at places where votes were being sought and not really based on need, doesn’t that smell of corruption?
Talk of the selection of pilgrims, both Christians and Muslims going to Jerusalem or Mecca respectively. The government nominees are selected on the basis of party affiliation but funded at government, read taxpayers’, expense. If going on those pilgrimages was what guaranteed heaven, then Angel Michael will be holding an APC flag to welcome the Nigerian dead to heaven! Ah, tell me again that that is not corruption and I will tell you what is.
Now let us go to the States and their Excellencies, the Governors. Here, it gets more interesting. Courioser and curriouser! Grand larceny in some states and, in some cases, legalized illegality and immoral legislations to back up what would be a very corrupt practice. This is where the pliable houses of assembly who are supposed to be representatives of the people make themselves malleable for a mess of pottage. What is worse, the pottage can even be made of rotten yams!
Take the example of the accursed and immoral retirement packages that Governors approve for themselves or the ‘smarter’ ones get their houseboy successors to approve just after their departure. Let me lift from my previous write-up on the same vexed subject titled “Governors’ Retirement Benefits As Legalised Corruption” of 27th September 2020:
“Prior to 2007 and the end of the first eight years of Nigeria’s 4th Republic, Governors usually retired and got the equivalent of senior civil servants benefits made up of gratuity and pension if they were civilian. Most of those who were Military Governors or Military Administrators either got military pensions commensurate with their ranks or returned back to the Army to continue earning their rank’s emoluments. Then came 2007 and the music changed. The impunity started, if I recall clearly, from the Centre of Excellence which some yuppies lovingly call Las Gidi but Old School folks still call it Lagos. That’s where Olojukokoro (ask Google) arrived on the scene and the handshake crossed the elbow. The law, the first of its kind in Nigeria, signed at the twilight of the 1999 – 2007 administration in that State is cited as the Public Office Holder (Payment of Pension) Law.
The law states that any Governor who completes two terms in office consecutively is entitled to:
1. A house each in any location of their choice in Lagos AND Abuja
2. Six new cars every three years
3. 100% of the basic salary of the serving Governor
4. Free health care for himself and members of his family in any part of the world
5. Furniture allowance which is 300% of their basic salary.
This law, which some considered obnoxious, immediately spread like coronavirus and many other State Governors domesticated it by creating their own versions of this disease. By 2019, the following states in addition to Lagos had domesticated the law: Rivers, Delta, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom, Imo, Osun, Kano, Kogi, Oyo, Bauchi, Nassarawa, Borno, Gombe, Abia, Katsina, Zamfara, Kwara, Enugu, Ebonyi, Jigawa, Niger, Sokoto, Anambra, Yobe and Edo. Even if you argue that Lagos was very financially buoyant at the time of the rushed passage of this bill by a pliant House of Assembly purportedly representing the people, how do you justify these atrocious benefits in a country where folks cannot afford 3 meals a day, some living under bridges and beggars roam the streets struggling for space with dirty looking or even naked metal-health challenged compatriots? It is even worse than very poor states with almost nil internally generated revenues joined this pernicious bandwagon that pauperizes their own states further.
Who did not hear of an incompetent non-resident Governor that ran Zamfara State aground demanding the payment of his monthly, wait for it, 10 million naira upkeep allowance from his predecessor who, thankfully, abrogated the law to the benefit of the suffering masses of Zamfara people. Just imagine a governor that hardly spent a week a month in Zamfara and left the state embroiled in bandits-induced deaths, the ravaging of their farms, rustling of their cattle and even violation of their female folk! Such a one was being compensated with humungous benefits for his eight years of indolence, incompetence and the devastation of beautiful Zamfara under his watch.
Does anyone still remember our ace journalist and beautiful daughter of Zamfara – Kadara Ahmed – leading protests to call attention to the untenable state of insecurity in her beloved state? Some people called her names while the Governor then – Abdulaziz Yari – doubled as Chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum and lived it up in Abuja! It was this indolent Yari that was collecting and was to collect for life, the princely N10m monthly upkeep allowance while able-bodied Zamfara young men with no jobs and education migrate Southwards for menial jobs or go into humiliating beggarhood. Is this fair?
The Edo House of Assembly pushed through an amendment to the pension law at the end of an eight-year two-term governorship tenure in 2007. The amendment added, in the Nigerian political lexicon, was a juicy part that entitled the retired Governor to the ‘provision of a house’ in a choice location in Nigeria for the former Governor provided the cost of the building shall not be in excess of N200m. Other ‘pecks’ are:
1. A pension for life equivalent to 100% of his last annual salary
2. Free medical treatment for the former governor and his family
3. An officer not above salary grade level 12 as Special Assistant
4. A Personal Secretary not below Level 10 selected from Edo State Public Service
5. Three vehicles, replaceable every five years
6. Three drivers, two armed policemen and two cooks
Going into a retirement of luxury after just eight years of work using khaki uniform as a smokescreen is the most hoodwinking of all. To be fair to him, our immediate past Governor was just one of more than twenty-six State Governors who had taken a cue from the infamous Lagos example. However, his ‘claim to sainthood’ and being on the side of the masses whose pensions were not being paid regularly, some dying in the pursuit of endless, incompetently handled, pensioner verification has been called to question. The other Governors wore no khaki, never claimed to be comrades of the downtrodden and for many, their states were more financially buoyant than Edo. Yet, we rushed through a law to make the very comfortable eight-year tenured politician more luxuriant while the walking stick-wielding, arthritis-ravaged worker who toiled for 35 years had his N35,000 a month pension entitlement left unpaid. How wicked can this world be? How inhumane!
Akwa Ibom Former Governor and Deputy Governor’s Pension Law is even more interesting. In addition to a 5-bedroom ‘maisonette’ in Abuja, or Akwa Ibom for the former Governor, it also includes free medical services to the tune of N100m for the Governor and N30m for the Deputy, wait for it, per annum! The former Governor must be entitled to massive illness of gargantuan proportions and his Deputy only entitled to ill-health equivalent to one-third of the Governor’s entitlement! I guess, the poor Deputy was never allowed to have his excrement more than a third of the Governor’s pooh weight in the Government House toilet facility. This is an example of what Zebrudaya called nonsense and ingredients! The Akwa Ibom law allegedly also includes 300% furniture allowance, 300% vehicle maintenance and fueling, 300% severance gratuity, yearly utility of 100%, and entertainment of 100%! And the state will bear the cost of the ex-Governor’s funeral. The spouse will be entitled to N12m medical allowance if she survives the husband. That law was made for the man who wants to be your Senate President now.
Zamfara State House of Assembly, following the current Governor’s publicly expressed umbrage after Yari’s audacious demand for a damnable and undeserved allowance promptly abrogated the law authorizing the pension scam. The significant and praiseworthy aspect of this courageous and moral action is that the current Governor clearly gave a signal that he would not be collecting that allowance himself on retirement. We were hoping that other Governors would follow suit, or at least review their pension laws to be in tandem with the economic realities of those they governed, as they did when the Lagos example was set. Alas, it is morning yet on creation day. Zamfara for all of them seems to be a bridge too far!
We are waiting for who would be courageous enough, indeed genuinely altruistic, to run the gauntlet next.”
That was written in 2020. Now, three years later, the Governor, the one with a small head that looks like he is going to be felled by the wind, who stopped Yari on his immoral N10m monthly tracks, is said to have purloined his state blind. While the bandits were ravaging the people collecting ransom from the poor folks before they can even be allowed to farm, the governor apparently had his hands in the till, allegedly. Now his state high court judge, probably appointed or juiced for eight years by him, rules that the EFCC cannot probe into his state’s financial affairs even when it is allegedly glaring that he was playing ludo with the people’s commonwealth! Haba, oga, is Zamfara not part of Nigeria and is stealing Zamfara’s money not a financial crime punishable in Nigeria?
Why will he not just clear his name by submitting to EFCC investigation and possible judicial assessment? We have seen these shenanigans by governors before. There was the case of a Governor in the South-South from whom money he stole from his state was recovered in London. It was an aghast populace and citizens of the state that were told by the sitting State Governor that the state’s money was not missing! This was being done to protect his godfather. He left his state in the lurch and sided with his sponsor and enforcer. Did he not turn later, when the funds were returned to Nigeria, that the funds belong to his state and should be returned? Talk of shameless and immoral somersaulting in the public glare!
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What the Governors do with land, given to them for safekeeping and use on behalf of the people, can sometimes leave you with a sad impression that corruption is the objective of being in the government house. Look at what happened in Kano this week – massive demolition of houses built on government lands through shady processes by the governor who left power just a week ago on 29th May 2023. Now the bulldozers are roaring and the last has not been heard. For someone we all saw putting away bundles and bundles of $100 dollar bills into cavernous babanriga and fila on widely shared videos years ago, this was not a surprise. And to see him today as being the closest to the present Aso Rock tenant is a bit worrisome. Even frightening.
Did the government lands allegedly shared out to gubernatorial friends and surrogates by the immediate past government in Edo State not have their Cs-of-O revoked by the current incumbent whose own tenure expires next year? He was a beneficiary but wisely revoked his own prior to dealing with all the other immorally allocated GRA lands sold for peanuts to friends and surrogates. It is reassuring that some such lands are being prepared today for development for the public good. When next you visit the golf course in Benin, take a look at the parcel of land between Benin Club and H. Omo Osagie Avenue. There lies the evidence. I hope the incumbents take a cue and shun the corrupt sharing of valuable government lands. Repercussions may come sooner than you expect! Even if you consider your successor your surrogate. Caveat Emptor…
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