By BASHIR ADEFAKA
Tuesday October 16, 2018 started with me like a bright day. It was supposed to be a day a federating unit in our great nation, Ekiti State, was to have a change of baton having successfully passed through an electoral process on Saturday July 14 of the year.
As planned and truly hopefully looked out to, victorious beneficiary of the process, Dr. John Kayode Fayemi, to the glory of Almighty Allah, was successfully and peacefully inaugurated and sworn in as substantively elected Governor of Ekiti State that Tuesday October 16, 2018.
What made the day a sad later was the celebration of corruption that we saw in the brand of voluntary surrender to Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) by the controversial person that just finished his four years tenure in Oke Isha, the Government House of the state, Mr. Peter Ayodele Fayose.
Fayose, before this day, had been accused of severally attempting to escape from the country before the handing over day until he was officially blocked through a letter by EFCC to the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) informing its Director General, Col. Hameed Ali, that the person in question had been placed on watch list.
The controversial politician, however, condemned the action of the anti-corruption agency saying it had no reason to place him on watch list after he had written a letter notifying it of his plan to willingly surrender himself immediately after his handing over on October 16, 2018.
If truly Fayose’s claim of willing or voluntary surrender of self to EFCC was real, the show of shame that was watched globally of his so called voluntary surrender on Tuesday October 16 nullified that claim.
It is only in Nigeria that a public officer would have more than enough evidence backing allegations of economic robbery, corruption and murder against him and some so-called defending citizens like Governor of Rivers State, Lawyer Nyesom Wike, former Minister of Aviation of Nigeria, Lawyer Femi Fani-Kayode, a product (or is he a legal ally) of late Chief Gani Fawehinmi and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Chief Mike Ozekhome, would be accompany him wearing ridiculous t-shirt with inscription “EFCC I’m Here” trying to bastardize the process of his trial from start. It makes me – like many other well meaning Nigerians – sad!
More saddening was the allegation of “ordered to be detained” and defence of the “detained” fellow by his media aide, Lere Olayinka, given on the AIT Television night of same Tuesday. Olayinka had claimed that his former principal, Fayose, was not invited by the EFCC but that he voluntarily submitted himself and that on getting there “he was ordered to be detained” and he said that repeatedly; without shame!
The little succour I had from that AIT programme came from the clarification by Vice Chairman of Buhari Support Organisation (BSO), Mallam Aliyu Abdullahi. It was Abdullahi who questioned Lere Olayinka how he arrived at his claim of “ordered to be detained” to which he had no answer. Abdullahi had questioned him to mention who ordered EFCC to detain Fayose but in the absence of answer from the man who later claimed to educate his co-discussant, he was rather forced to receive knowledge that EFCC was never tele-guided by anybody except that it does what is necessary.
He said further enlightened the Fayose’s aide to know that the fact that his boss submitted himself does not mean he would not be held back. He the law permits that he can be held for 48 hours and that it after 48 hours and he has not been charged to court that he can now be said to have been detained but warned the guy against misrepresentation of facts in matter of fight against corruption as it regards the EFCC.
Now to me, if Fayose actually voluntarily submitted himself, like he claimed in his letter that he would do and like claimed on the AIT programme by his media aide, what then was the cry of “ordered to be detained” about? What was the blabbing by that governor, former minister, SAN and all of the celebrated “EFCC I’m Here” t-shirt for, if not that the whole hullabaloo about a promised voluntary submission was nothing but farce?
While I will have to warn so-called Nigerian youths like Lere Olayinka to take a cue from the past and be guided by commonsense for the sake of posterity, let me admonish all high profile personalities in the country bearing the ropes of corruption in their necks and thus being brought to the anti-corruption agency to clear themselves or otherwise face trial to stop playing on the intelligence of the masses of Nigerian people.
This is apt because, the anger of the people on whose intelligence they play can be so disastrous realizing that there can be no law without the people and if the good of the people is the reason for which the law exists, it will take the people to change hanky-panky employed in the process of justice delivery by all of these elements. So, let them take warning before it is too late!
Imagine a man, who claimed to have submitted himself voluntarily to justice, not only bringing his supporters to Abuja headquarters of EFCC with media people to create scene but also being accompanied by the likes of Wike, Fani-Kayode, Ozekhome all of who made utterances derogatory to the sovereignty of Nigerian Nation! Fani-Kayode, who as former minister is expected to be polite in his utterances about matter affecting national interest, in apparent disapproval of the Fayose’s submission said that “the international community is looking at what is going to happen here today”; Ozekhome a supposedly Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) said “Nigeria is in tyranny today!” and Fayose himself claiming the messiah to Nigeria that, in all honesty, he does not stand. If you voluntarily submitted yourself to law, why all the cries with intent to incite Nigerians against the government and these are politicians that have just pushed Alhaji Atiku Abubakar forward as Presidential Candidate to push their party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) back to power.
Nigerians still have fresh memory of the fact that PDP politicians were sacked from corridors of power only three and a half years ago on the grounds they were drift the country towards a total collapse with their officially recognized corruption; fake economic success pronouncing Nigeria as largest economy in Africa whereas all that the nation had in the face of oil windfall was empty and deeply looted treasury; insecurity through which Nigeria’s territories were falling into the hands of Boko Haram who therefore were already hoisting their flag as a Republic; and their entrenchment of devastating division among the already complex, cosmopolitan populace along ethnicity and religion lines.
All of those comments by those people, incidentally of the said opposition PDP, are no more or less than attempt to politicize national security to discredit the anti-corruption war of the current administration and the government of President Muhammadu Buhari must stand its ground and cut them to sizes. No law gives any opposition politician the right or protection to be averse to anything that is done to achieve collective good.
History of recent times does not have good records of all of those blabbers: Wike, it would be recalled had his name and hands in the sponsored violence of Rivers rerun elections that claimed the lives of some patriotic citizens in service of the nation including ASP Mohammed Alkali who was beheaded during the violence. That Wike used the court to frustrate Police High Command investigations into the gruesome murder of that magnitude cannot be wished away in a hurry.
Femi Fani-Kayode, it would be recalled, is that Nigerian who himself has not only had his hands soiled in several ongoing corruption cases but also has tried all ways to instigate ethnic and religious wars in this country through many of his provocative writings being promoted by a section of the traditional media.
Ozekhome is that senior lawyer practicing in Nigeria to whose account the EFCC reportedly traced N75 million paid by then Governor Ayodele Fayose during the freezing of his accounts on order of court by the anti-corruption agency. He has had his name on the lips of many for other dubious cases to the extent that at one of annual Gani Fawehinmi Lectures, he was not only booed but denied entry in Lagos by lawyers who still have some level of conscience and integrity flowing in their blood streams. It was also Ozekhome who used his dubious legal technicality to secure freedom for Senator Dino Melaye from Police detention through the court and since then the senator has moved from tree-climbing to allegedly sponsoring thugs who shot bullets at police officers on duty and so on.
Now to talk of the main person, Fayose, who, despite daunting evidences including of his driver of how his share of money meant to fight Boko Haram to save the lives of Nigerians was loaded twice between Akure Airport and Ado-Ekiti, still went to court up to Supreme Court before President Buhari stood up to Judiciary corruption and got himself cleared. Because judiciary now under the leadership of Justice Onnoghen needed to clear itself and prove why it should be above board in matters of corruption, Fayose is back in investigation but, alas! Elements with questionable characters and wealth like him are on ground to defend him and they were, not even with a slight show of shame, making comments thinking they were painting the Africa’s number one anti-corruption government of Muhammadu Buhari in bad light, unknowingly that they were merely exposing themselves to the same international community they cry to. And they were doing that show of shame at a time the British Government has just given its nod to the Nigeria’s Presidency’s Executive Order 6 just upheld by an Abuja High Court. So sad!
I could go to bed with peace of mind, on the said Tuesday however, because the EFCC did the needful. Despite the abracadabra of that governor-minister-SAN-supporters stuff, Ibrahim Mustapha Magu-led Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) did a lockdown on the shameless man, Fayose, and the group of defenders could not even go into the EFCC cell to sleep with their messiah who had in his media briefing on arrival blabbed, “I am doing this for Nigeria”. Fayose must be sick upstairs. I have no apology!
To Lere Olayinka and all of those talkers who are talking for him and other Nigerians with stains of corruption splashed all over their bodies, thinking that the media war would have any pinch on the commitment of Buhari’s government to get to the roots of parasitic corruption their 16 years in power inflicted on the country, they should rethink because it will not work.
As for us, Nigerians, in support of the anti-corruption, anti-insecurity and pro-national re-engineering projects, we will continue to stand with the government of Buhari, no matter how much sweet-mouthed the #CorruptionFightBack agents can be.
