Civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association Of Nigeria (HURIWA), on Monday, lambasted the regime of the Nigerian President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), for breeding extremely corrupt government officials, especially of northern extraction, who feel a sense of entitlement.

HURIWA, in a statement by its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, said with the gargantuan and unprecedent corrupt practices perpetrated by government officials under Buhari, Nigeria might not find money to run the next government.

“It is becoming inevitable that with the highway robberies of public funds perpetrated by officials holding strategic national offices from the core Northern States like the President, Nigeria may need to borrow from China to be able to pay the first few months’ salaries of incoming President after May 29th 2022 if this administration won’t scuttle the election  by this deliberate permission and tolerance of heightened state of insecurity in the Country”. 

The group said many occasions have suggested that Buhari’s anti-graft fight is a grand charade as the regime was only a breeding ground to purloin Nigeria’s commonwealth.

“People are wondering if the Northerners holding strong positions in the central government are not looting to set up their earthly paradise elsewhere other than this Nigeria that they are running down and killing with staggering Crimes of corruption and brazen brigandage.

“If this proposition is incorrect, why then are Northern officials in government going ahead with massive looting even when a few of them have been exposed but nothing much by way of prosecutions have been done?”

HURIWA cited the promotion of former acting Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Ibrahim Magu, from a commissioner of police cadre to that of an assistant inspector general of police despite that he was sacked for alleged graft-related reasons and alleged abuse of office- allegations that till now are been hidden from public view and the report of the investigative panel headed by a retired President of the Court of Appeal for which billions of public funds would have been spent, has remained a mystery and then from the blues the main character who was dismissed from the EFCC was then promoted to AIG in retirement even when the entire South East of Nigeria got just one AIG amongst serving officers.

The group also pointed to the recent alleged graft purportedly perpetrated by another northerner in the person of the suspended Accountant-General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, who is being probed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for alleged fraud to the tune of N80bn and at least 17 properties in choice places in Nigeria and overseas. 

Also, according to Nobel laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, Buhari squashed a putrid egg against Nigerians’ faces with the pardon granted ex-governors of Plateau State, Senator Joshua Dariye; and Taraba State, Rev. Jolly Nyame.

The two former governors were jailed for stealing N2.7bn in total and are members of the ruling All Progressives Congress.

Many civil society organisations had censured the President and noted that the pardon of Dariye and Nyame would encourage corruption.

Recall also that another northerner, the then Managing Director of the Nigerian Ports Authority, Hadiza Bala-Usman, was suspended last year for alleged corruption to the tune of billions of naira but she is not prosecuted but left to flex around but not returned to her post and no words to the members of the Nigerian Public. 

HURIWA also said Nigerians must not forget that another northerner and a top police officer, DCP Abba Kyari, is in the custody of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency for alleged narcotics-related offences and alleged corruption of unimaginable proportion also traced to international fraudster, Ramon Abass aka Hushpuppi.

But government has done everything imaginable to refuse to extradited him to the USA but the same government has extradited Other Nigerians from the South to the USA to face charges over alleged fraud of less than the amount for which the disgraced police officer is being sought by the FBI by for which the Northern born AGF has done everything to undermine the extradition application of the Government of the USA.

While the United States wanted Kyari to be extradited to the US, the Nigerian government has tactically delayed him in Nigeria here, a form of protection and under the extant extradition treaty, if the application lingers for upto a year, it will become status barred meaning the suspect being sought in USA can no longer be surrendered. 

HURIWA’s Onwubiko said, “Nigerians are tired of the grand deception of the Buhari regime. It is disturbing how corruption has toppled the administration’s campaign promises and the fact that virtually all the top players in government are suspected of corruption. 

“Look at corruption in humanitarian affairs ministry. The corruption in the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.

“The Accountant General’s office. Corruption in the way All Progressives Congress members bought N100 million presidential forms by proxies. Truth be told, Buhari and the APC has killed any anti-corruption it met in 2015 with the cash for tickets policy it introduced towards 2023.

“We are afraid that the country won’t find money to run the next government going by the extremely heightened levels of corruption in the APC administration. Nigerians must reject any party deep in corruption in the next election and must vote in accountable leaders”, the group said.

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