A corpse ordinarily has no life and should therefore be allowed to rest in peace. Some corpses would, however, not be allowed to rest in perfect peace as a consequence of the evil they perpetrated while revelling in dishonour among the living. Such were the fuel subsidy scam corpses, which were buried in spectacular but shameless fashion during former President Goodluck Jonathan’s era and subsequent administrations in Nigeria until President Bola Tinubu angrily ended the carnage of fraud on May 29, 2023, during his presidential inauguration.
Last week, Long Range examined a quote (author unknown) about a nation that rewards corruption more speedily than acknowledging excellence. “When a nation pardons its criminals faster than it rewards its heroes, it teaches the next generation that corruption is not a crime but a career,” says the quote, which coincidentally has to do with the focus of today’s piece. This is actually a follow-up, as promised.
As being judgmental is an integral part of human nature, it is therefore necessary to tell my readers that I have no scores to settle with anyone, dead or alive. This reminder (if you see it as one) is my little contribution to have a society where excellence is rewarded and not brazen corruption; where fraudsters are not glorified; where thieving politicians do not transform themselves into political godfathers and kingmakers; where clerics do not hide under the cloak of religion to extort gullible worshippers who are trying to find solutions to the multidimensional problems created by the same ruling class they run to for cover.
We equally desire a society where those who are saddled with the responsibility of protecting the citizens do not turn their barrels on the people due to their unexplainable frustration; where military chiefs do not refuse to tackle insecurity with the seriousness it deserves because doing so will end the flow of bloody revenues into their deep blood-soaked pockets; and civil servants won’t transform into evil servants by undermining due process because a victim has refused to play ball.
As transformational as the tax reform, which took effect in January, is, many Nigerians won’t pay tax (this is not a prophecy) because the people can’t see the impact of the revenue generated on the infrastructural development in many states, despite the ballooning monthly federal allocations. This trend has become so bad that Tinubu had to appeal (appeal o!) to his governors to allow the people to feel and see the impact of the improved allocations from the federation account. Workers’ taxes power healthcare in saner climes, where our leaders run to treat headaches and stomach upset.
This reminds me of a former governor from the South-South, who is now enjoying the breeze of the National Assembly, who had claimed to have built “a world-class hospital” during his tenure as governor. He was ferried abroad after he was involved in a ‘junction’ accident in the nation’s capital. Former First Lady, Aisha Buhari, once let out a shrill cry from the sanctuary of Aso Villa during the regime of former President Muhammadu Buhari after she was told that ordinary syringes were absent in the Aso Rock Clinic despite an annual budgetary allocation of N9bn.
Despite this anomaly, the need to pay tax is incontestable. In 1927, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. of the US Supreme Court (as echoed by former US President Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1936) said, “Taxes are the price we pay for a civilised society.” Tinubu equally expressed his frustration with the apathy some Nigerians have towards paying taxes, but demand rapid development during his recent engagement in Kigali, Rwanda. The President, however, failed to address a situation where Zacchaeus collects taxes while some privileged elite collude with Bureau De Change operators to citizens’ sweat to a personal war chest. To power development, Nigerians must be encouraged to pay taxes.
Let’s come back to the heist that took place about 13 years ago during the controversial fuel subsidy regime, when some big men and portfolio businessmen ripped the nation off of trillions, which they are still enjoying to date, after a greedy federal lawmaker fell into the trap of another member of the fuel subsidy cabal. Farouk Lawan, a House of Representatives member from Kano, who headed the fuel subsidy probe committee in the House in 2012, returned home from jail after spending some years in prison. Saint Femi Otedola, the then Chairman of Zenon Petroleum and Gas, a company listed as one of the alleged beneficiaries of the fuel subsidy scam, who organised a sting operation that hooked Lawan, and many others on this infamous list, are still a successful business personality, and some have transformed into role models, by our own definition.
It may be necessary to refresh your memory about the fuel subsidy fraud during the Jonathan era, which ignited nationwide outrage, rightly attracting one of the countless probes in the National Assembly, but which are characteristically fruitless. Seun O, a small-scale fraudster (the court said so), had obtained a loan of about N300m from a bank, which he had refused to pay, forcing the bank to drag him before a Lagos court. During the trial, Seun disappeared. As fate would have it, he was arraigned by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for fuel subsidy fraud in 2012 in the same court (before the same judge), where he was standing trial for breach of agreement and refusal to pay a loan before he jumped bail.
The surprised judge quickly recognised this ‘customer’, asking him some questions to confirm his true identity. The judge eventually ordered that Seun’s Nigerian and British passports be seized to ensure that he didn’t jump bail again. Despite the judge’s precautionary measure, these serial suspects still fled the shores of Nigeria (how would I know how?), and the money he scammed the nation of was never recovered. But then, Seun never made the list of infamy in the House of Reps; this list belonged to the real thieves (or real deals), who stole the nation blind and got protection from the state in a humongous graft ably supervised by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.
The fraud was not sudden; it was systemic, planned over the years with miraculous progression and executed with technological precision. In 2009, Nigeria spent 198 billion on fuel subsidy. The following year, the payment climbed by more than 100 per cent to N416.4bn. In 2011, however, the demons of financial corruption descended in bodily form and took refuge in Nigeria, forcing the nation to cough out N1.9bn in subsidy payment on fuel, without any justifiable explanation from the NNPC. Remember, it was an election year, a year of magic in itself.
After the outrage that trailed the 2011 figure, subsidy payment dropped to N690bn in 2012, which was still high because some arrowheads of the 2011 scam had continued their heist in the apex oil corporation, the raging anger of the people notwithstanding.
The revelations of this unimaginable fraud by the House led to the January 2012 massive protests when the Jonathan government announced an increase in fuel prices without explaining or resolving the magical spike in fuel subsidy spending of 2011. The protest was spearheaded by the Save Nigeria Group, led by Pastor Tunde Bakare, not by any political opposition figures as some emergency experts and voodoo influencers would want Nigerians to believe.
The House committee discovered that some fuel importers presented the same vessel of petroleum products several times to claim multiple payments, called round-tripping. The bankers understand this term better. Some importers and portfolio marketers, like Seun, didn’t import any fuel at all but still stole billions from the nation’s coffers in the name of roguish subsidy claims.
A malleable Lawan landed in prison after his conviction in 2021 for receiving about $500m out of an agreed $3m bribe from Otedola to remove Zenon Petroleum and Gas from the fraudsters’ list in a famous sting operation. Lawan completed his jail term in 2024. End of story!
So, where is the fraudsters’ list containing the names of individuals, groups and companies indicted by the Lawan committee? From my layman’s understanding, the bribe didn’t precede the list; the dollar bribe was collected after the list was compiled and before the beginning of the investigation of those allegedly involved in the scam. It could be deduced that the bribe did not influence the list of the suspected scammers. In other words, this list, which meanwhile reminds the nation of its sad history, remains valid to date. It is my opinion, which may not count, that this list should be revisited by the present government.
It is inconceivable that a nation with so much money in the private pockets of known rogues could embark on serial borrowing to fund projects. How could the controversial setup of Lawan suddenly discredit this important list and corrupt the process to recover billions stashed in private pockets and offshore accounts? Don’t think I was unaware that the government of the day was behind Lawan’s problem because some corrupt elements in the ruling party then must be protected. Does that muffle the understanding that government is a continuum?
The current government should exhume this list (it is still in the House of Reps) and ensure that the humongous money involved in this massive rip-off of the nation is recovered (at the current rate with interest) even if the government is no longer interested in prosecuting the suspected fraudsters.
Oyo school kidnap
This should have been a major piece of Long Range today, but for the promise I made last week to revisit the forgotten fuel subsidy fraud probe, which has been sadly confined to the dustbin of history.
Some lunatics were said to have invaded Baptist Nursery and Primary School, Yawota; Community Grammar School, Ahoro-Esinele; and L.A. Primary School, all in the Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State, around 9.30am on Friday last week, where several teachers and pupils, including children, were kidnapped.
The invasion of the schools in broad daylight happened as the state governor, Seyi Makinde, was making elaborate preparations to declare his controversial presidential bid on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party─Action Peoples Movement coalition, a platform that does not exist.
Last year, Long Range warned the Federal Government and the South-West states that the takeover of Kwara State meant that the last peaceful region in the country risks an upheaval not witnessed in the history of the South-West since the infamous ‘Operation We Tie’ of the defunct Western Region. Characteristically, both the states and Abuja continue as if nothing is amiss. Even Makinde, who once raised the alarm that some terrorists had taken over some forests in the state, paid little attention to the looming danger, preferring to use Oyo State funds to bankroll opposition party politics as if this transforms into an achievement.
The Oyo State governor is not the only one engaged in this illogical priority of focus. All South-West governors should bury their heads in shame for allowing this scandalous breach of security in any of the states in the region while embarking on frivolous political campaigns when their houses are on fire. For months, terrorists have been having a field day in Ondo State, killing and freely picking up residents on farms, on the highways and even in the sanctuaries of their homes, while Ekiti State has continued to play a dangerous game of silence on the persistent insecurity at its border communities.
Amotekun operatives, who are expected to scare criminals in the region, have transformed into owambe guards, mounting checkpoints in some instances. Who says drones couldn’t locate terrorists or kidnappers’ hideouts in the forests?
Over a month ago, I wrote about a Nigerian, Bisi Adegbuyi, the former Postmaster General of the Federation, who had developed a technology that could be employed in the nation’s fight against terrorists and their allied brothers. As I write this, I doubt if any of the government agencies, which appear to be fighting insecurity or any states, including Adegbuyi’s state, have made enquiries on how they could tackle this national malady with his homegrown technology.
May the President have the courage to see through his promise to ensure the establishment of state police in the country. It will make it difficult for deranged minds, who have sacked peace in their states, to extend their tentacles of evil to peaceful domains.
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