Posted by By MUSTAPHA ALIU and FRANK EZE on
Fresh facts have emerged to effectively throw light on the roles played by some politicians and their soul mates in the business community, in the failed tenure elongation gambit of former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
• How the plot was hatched •The losers and gainers
Fresh facts have emerged to effectively throw light on the roles played by some politicians and their soul mates in the business community, in the failed tenure elongation gambit of former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
It has also brought to the fore, the intrigues, back-stabbing, greed and the unseen hands of fifth columnists which contributed to the failure of the fraudulent project.
Sunday Sun authoritatively gathered that the failed multi-billion Naira project, executed in four stages, was the brain-child of the ex-governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Saminu Turaki.
Incidentally, Turaki, who is today standing trial for alleged stealing while in office as governor, claims that he was compelled to finance the Third Term project to the tune of $10 million.
Stoutly supported by the duo of the former Special Assistant to the President on Domestic Affairs, Dr. Andy Uba and former Deputy Senate President, Ibrahim Mantu, the ex-Jigawa State boss reportedly canvassed arguments to convince the former President that he could extend his tenure beyond the eight years provided in the 1999 Constitution.
Having successfully convinced Obasanjo, Mantu was subsequently drafted to spear-head the plot. He was specifically saddled with the responsibility of getting the Senate to endorse the necessary amendments to the 1999 Constitution to pave the way for Obasanjo to stay longer in office.
To facilitate his work, Sunday Sun learnt that the Plateau State-born politician received N500 million mobilization.
Despite the huge war chest at his disposal, the Obasanjo Presidency was apprehensive of the lack of progress by Mantu. Thus, Aso Rock resolved to broaden the base by recruiting more hands for the job. That was how Chief Tony Anenih, then chairman of the People's Democratic Party (PDP) Board of Trustees, Senators David Mark and Tunde Ogbeha were recruited into the team during the second phase.
Besides Anenih's reputation as master of political intrigues, his position as the BOT chairman was also seen as a boost to the plot. Mark and Ogbeha - both retired Generals - were said to have been co-opted to give additional bite to the strategic aspect of the plot, especially in the Senate where Mantu had proved incompetent in handling the assignment.
Chief Bode George and Mrs. Olubunmi Etteh, the new Speaker of the House of Representatives, were in charge of the South-west axis.
In the third stage of the project, the proponents resolved to bring in some state governors. Sunday Sun learnt that the move to get the governors involved was chiefly informed by the belief that they had a strong hold on the legislators from their states, and would naturally not hesitate to buy into the project since they also stood to benefit, given the promise of 'general application".
Prominent among those co-opted were the then governors Ahmed Makarfi of Kaduna State, Sam Egwu of Ebonyi State, Chimaroke Nnamani of Enugu State, Abdullahi Adamu of Nasarawa State, Ali Modu Sherrif of Borno State and Bukola Saraki of Kwara State.
Ex-governors Peter Odili of Rivers State and James Ibori of Delta State, according to Sunday Sun sources, were specifically brought in to help fund the project. Odili was said to have pumped in N9 billion to see the project through.
Then Bayelsa State governor and now Vice President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, was also said to have contributed immensely to the Third Term bid.
Former Governor Nnamani, who like Turaki has been put on trial on corruption charges, was said to have drawn the ire of his co-travelers in the project, when he allegedly bungled the Enugu zonal conference organised by the Mantu committee for the South-east.
Nnamani fell out with Obasanjo when whispers got to the former president that he (Nnamani) actually criticized the project. His undoing, it was further learnt, was his indiscretion to confide in a close associate that the proposed Third Term project would not work because Nigeria was not a 'Banana Republic".
From there, the conspiracy moved into the fourth stage. Captains of industry and money bags, including industrialist, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, then Manufacturers' Association of Nigeria (MAN) chairman; Chief Charles Ugwu (now Minister of Industry); Mr. Jim Ovia of Zenith Bank, Mr. Festus Odimegwu (then of Nigerian Breweries) and Dr. Ndi Okereke-Onyiuke of the Stock Exchange, were all brought in.
Curiously, as the ranks of the proponents swelled, so did the subtle and discrete opposition.
A minister in the Obasanjo cabinet had confessed to Sunday Sun that there were fifth columnists among them, such that whatever was discussed behind closed doors at night, always found its way to the pages of newspapers the following morning.
Indeed, Sunday Sun gathered that a few days to the opening of debate on the floor of the Senate on the issue, Obasanjo had reportedly summoned then Senate President, Ken Nnamani to the Villa.
Flanked by Bode George and National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr. Ahmadu Ali, Obasanjo reportedly told Nnamani in no uncertain terms that it was in his interest to get the Senate - however he would do it - to approve the relevant amendments to the Constitution to pave way for him to realise his ambition.
Convinced that with Nnamani shaken a bit, all loose ends had been tightened, the President jetted out of the country for an international summit.
But no sooner had he left the shores of Nigeria than a senior official in the Presidency invited Nnamani back to the Villa.
The official, who is still occupying the same position today, was said to have pleaded with the Senate President to work against the project. And he did!