The Save Nigeria Group (SNG) has raised an alarm over the current travails of former Kwara State Governor, Senator Bukola Saraki saying it was connected with his fuel subsidy motion which has exposed the rot in the oil industry, alleging that the cabal was against the senator.
SNG executive, Tanko Yunussa, who stated this yesterday, said it was regrettable that since leaving office, no one had found it necessary to dig into the former governor’s administration until now that he moved for the motion that exposed the stealing of the nation’s funds.
Senator Bukola Saraki had moved the motion to investigate the current fuel subsidy management, considering the challenges it posed to the implementation of the 2011 budget on September 16, 2011 in which he raised questions about the fraud in the management of the subsidy.
The Special Fraud Unit (SFU) of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) recently invited the former governor over an N8.5 billion loan granted by the defunct Intercontinental Bank Plc to some companies he is alleged to be a shareholder.
Condemning the invitation by the police, CNPP Secretary General, Chief Willy Ezugwu said, “The fallout of the motion is the hounding and antagonizing of Senator Saraki, by detractors who are beneficiaries of the sleaze embedded in the subsidy administration. These characters have moved to resurrect a matter that was earlier settled in the appropriate manner by bringing out one company out of 17 and using its transactions to persecute Senator Saraki.
?“It is shameful that the hunted is now the hunter, it is only in Nigeria that members of the subsidy cabal can still raise their heads high and even be bold enough to start hunting the man who exposed their evil for Nigerians to see,” Chief Ezugwu said.
A leader of thought in Kwara State, Alhaji Shuaibu Adamu also lamented that Nigeria has lost moral values. Adamu, a former local government chairman in 1996, urged President Jonathan to speak up for the Senator.
“Sarak should even be given an award for daring to speak up where others have allowed corruption to have a free reign in the land,” Ezugwu said.
Also, the president of Coalition of Civil Society Organisations for Transparency in Governance, Comrade Ibrahim Ali has described the invitation as politically motivated and a battle against Nigerians who have shown the will and commitment in fighting corruption.
“This signal being sent by the Federal Government and its agencies is a clear demonstration that the war against corruption is going nowhere. It is high time we call on the Federal Government and its agencies in the anti-corruption crusade to concentrate their energies and attention on how best to fight corruption which is a cankerworm that has eaten deeply into the fabrics of our socio-economic and political development as a nation to demonstrate the seriousness of government to the poor masses rather than politicizing every attempt or contribution by stakeholders to move the nation forward.
“History has it that it is only when evil men are exposed and punished that a society assumes its pride in history and not when wrongs are swept under the carpet because perpetuators are connected to the powers that be in the society.
“The only way government can convince us that it is still interested in implementing the report is to bring the perpetuators to book and not using guerilla tactics to rubbish patriots who have staked their lives for government policies on anti-corruption to survive. We shall resist every unlawful means to punish people for other people’s sins,” Ali said.