allAfrica.com: Nigeria: Yar'Adua Fires the First Salvo? (Page 1 of 1)

As President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua finally weighs in on the financial misconduct that has dogged the Federal Ministry of Health, which snags the Minister, Prof. Adenike Grange, the Minister of State, Chief Gabriel Aduku, and several directors of her ministry in the EFCC web, the question now is: has the President finally sighted the starting blocks for work to begin?

Precisely a fortnight ago, EFCC sources told newsmen that the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry, Professor Samuel Ogamdi, Director of Administration, H.B Oyedepo, and the Director of Finance were also guests of the anti-graft agency.

The top brass of the ministry were quizzed for several days and for many reasons, among which were the award of contracts while neglecting to follow due process and failure to return unspent votes in the 2007 budget to the treasury as directed by the President.

They were also alleged to have mismanaged funds meant for staff welfare at Christmas.

THISDAY learnt that a petition had been sent to the EFCC alleging that funds meant for end of year bonuses for staff of the Ministry were misappropriated by the Minister and other top officials of the ministry.

In that transaction alone, the ministry's top officials were said to have done away with about N300 million which was withdrawn to be shared among the staff of the ministry as their Christmas bonuses. In the arrangement, the most junior staff was expected to cart N175, 000, home, while deputy directors were to get N2.5 million. Directors were to get a whooping N3.5 million each.

But trouble started when the sharing formula was jettisoned. The aggrieved, who felt short-changed, petitioned the anti-graft agency, the EFCC.

The matter could have died naturally but the president, according to sources, has expressed utmost disgust with graft in private and public, saying that since the federal government controls over 50 per cent of the resources of the country, it is its duty to lead by example. In short, charity must begin at home. It is in fortifying this sentiment that Grange was referred by the presidency to the EFCC.

Grange was questioned by the EFCC the same weekend even though she vehemently denied being arrested over the alleged financial misconduct. As any politician in Nigeria would quickly do, she played the blame game and pointed accusing fingers at her detractors for trying to drag her name in the mud.

But her media officer later issued a statement admitting that on Friday, Febuary 29, his boss was invited to the EFCC headquarters to make a statement which she did. But the blame game did not stop there. In an attempt to divert attention or the spotlight from her table, Grange initiated an investigation into the allegations, purportedly to determine the nature, scope and persons involved for the purpose of, as she put it, appropriate action.

In fact, she also attempted to douse the tension by courting the presidency when she intoned in one of her press releases that "the mandate of the Federal Ministry of Health to improve the health of Nigerians is being pursued vigorously within the context of Mr. President's Seven-Point Agenda", adding that she would not allow the scam, which to her were mere allegations, to distract her attention from her task. But the EFCC remained unfazed by her resilience and decisive obstinacy. It went on with its investigation.

As all this was going on, however, the presidency was becoming weighed down and sickened by the incessant groping in the dark on the part of the minister. And anyone would.

The presidency finally put its foot down and decided that enough is enough. Their times are up. They were forced to throw in the towel to "sort themselves out" with the anti-corruption agency.

To on-lookers and public policy analysts, this is a sign of good things to come, in an administration that has shown neither will nor desire to act when public opinion weighs heavily against its footmen. This is why this action must jolt the administration's Doubting Thomases just as it would raise salient questions of a historical nature.

One of the questions is: how genuine, or how punitive, and how real is this supposed to be taken by the nation? Is this a copy of the Olusegun Obasanjo's PR tactics or is it the sign of what would finally define Yar'Adua's presidency?

In 2004, the then Minister of Labour, Husseini Zannuwa Akwanga, was relieved of his ministerial position by Obasanjo following the National Identification Card scandal which rocked the Ministry of Internal Affairs while he held forte there. That action by the Obasanjo government triggered national consciousness and agitation for prudence in public office.

The then Minister of Education, Prof Fabian Osuji, had also fallen by the wayside over the bride-for-budget scandal which also claimed the then Senate President, Chief Adolphus Wabara. The euphoria had hardly died down when an Inspector-General of Police, Alhaji Tafa Balogun, crumbled to his greedy desires.

But while the nation relished its assumed triumph over official graft, the corridors of power secretly derided the nation. Things eventually turned out to be nothing but a jingle. When Obasanjo finally bowed out of power, he became public enemy number one due to what the nation perceives as his skill in making impressions loom larger than reality.

Today, scepticism has even heightened far and above the normal. While some are asking if Yar'Adua has just fired the first salvo in shaping the direction of his administration where curbing graft is key, many are already seeing a smokescreen that will soon go the way of this regime's parent government. But still inveterate optimists are willing to give the new-comer a chance and they are asking: has work just begun? Will Yar'Adua sustain the momentum and win public trust or is it going to be just another showmanship?

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