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The Action Congress (AC) has commended the uncommon courage and patriotism of the House of Representatives in probing the power sector expenditure between 1999 and 2007, expressing the hope that the probe would help turn around the fortunes of the country‘s power sector.
The Action Congress (AC) has commended the uncommon courage and patriotism of the House of Representatives in probing the power sector expenditure between 1999 and 2007, expressing the hope that the probe would help turn around the fortunes of the country‘s power sector.
In a statement issued in Abuja by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said, however, that the House panel must pursue the investigation to a logical conclusion and not allow themselves to be cowed or intimidated by anyone.
It said going by the revelations so far made at the public sitting of the panel - which we know represent just a tip of the iceberg - the stakes are obviously high, and that some unscrupulous persons, especially those who have not been able to explain what they did with the huge public funds they collected, would stop at nothing to stop or sabotage the probe.
AC said the hearing has shown that contracts awarded in the critical power sector under the General Olusegun Obasanjo's administration were not given to improve the country's power situation, which fell from 2600MW in 1999 to 2300MW in 2007, but to feather the nest of Obasanjo's cronies and silence those who could criticise his administration.
'Perhaps, the greatest shocker so far is the revelation that former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who preached and hollered about anti-corruption and due process, single handedly awarded huge, multi-billion naira contracts without recourse to the tender's board at the federal level.
'It is now clear what was behind Obasanjo's ill-advised third term agenda: to cover up all these sleaze. That probably explains why firms linked to former Heads of State got juicy contracts in the power sector - to make them support the third term. Little wonder all those who should have condemned the third term agenda conveniently lost their voices then,'' the party said.
'We can only say that anyone, no matter how highly placed, who got money for any contract must account for such money. And anyone who fails to account for funds collected must be brought to book."
That is how it should be in a system governed by the rule of law,'' it said.
The party said it is shocking, to say the least, to learn from the public sitting that some companies collected money but never even visited their contract site.
'Now we know why the past administration spent a whopping 16 billion dollars only to further push Nigeria into darkness. The contracts were designed to siphon Nigeria's funds, reward cronies and silence possible critics,'' it said.
AC said the House must extend its probe to other sectors of the economy, especially the oil sector, where former President Obasanjo held sway as Minister; the repair of the refineries; award of crude oil contracts; oil block allocations; privatisation, aviation and railways, just to mention a few.
'May we also recommend to the House of Representatives, and indeed all Nigerians for compulsory reading, a well-researched piece by retired Col. Abubakar Umar on how Nigeria was looted between 1999 and 2007. The revelations in that write-up must be subjected to close public scrutiny under a process that will be fair to all concerned,'' the party said.