The Coalition Against Corrupt Leaders (CACOL) has flayed the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke for stalling the investigation by the House of Representatives into the N10bn she allegedly spent on a chartered private jet, Challenger 850, in the last two years for her trips.
The House Committee on Public Accounts investigating the expenditure was set to conduct a public hearing on Monday, but it was stalled by an Abuja Federal High Court order. Alison- Madueke and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation listed the National Assembly and the House of Representatives as the defendants in the suit with reference number FHC/ABJ/CS/295/2014 and dated April 11, 2014.
Reacting to the development, the Executive Chairman of the Coalition, Comrade Debo Adeniran, averred that the minister’s action portrays her as guilty as charged.
He said, “It is now clearer that Mrs. Alison-Madueke has got something to hide and that is why she is desperate to go any length to halt a public hearing. It is incredible that a public office holder could be running away from a public hearing that will only allow her to shed light on entangled issues which the public do not have up-to-date information on. That is a way to show that she is guilty as charged because she doesn’t have any defense against the allegations preferred against her. That is why she rushed to court, knowing fully that it is easy to manipulate some courts in Nigeria to get corrupt elements off the hook or at least, some reprieve for the time being. If she doesn’t have anything to hide, she would be happy to prove her innocence to the panel investigating her. But because she knows she does not possess any evidence and witnesses to testify that she didn’t commit the offence she was accused of, that’s why she rushed to a malleable court where she could get easy injunction. It is a confirmation that she is guilty as charged.”
The anti-corruption crusader however called for the apposite prosecution of the minister for her crime against the Nigerian people.
“Now that the woman has stopped the house from probing her, the next thing the House of Reps should do is to get the anti-graft agencies to go after her, get her promptly arrested, prosecuted and jailed for her crimes against the Nigerian people”, Adeniran stated.
Abimbola Adegoke
Media Officer, CACOL
29th April, 2014
