Posted by By GODWIN TSA Abuja on
Immediate past Governor of Abia State and Chairman, Board of Trustees of the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, has accused President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua of foot-dragging in prosecuting his predecessor, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, in the face of overwhelming allegations of corrupt practices against him.
Immediate past Governor of Abia State and Chairman, Board of Trustees of the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, has accused President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua of foot-dragging in prosecuting his predecessor, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, in the face of overwhelming allegations of corrupt practices against him.
Accusing the administration of selective justice, Kalu expressed fears that Obasanjo may not be prosecuted after all.
The former Abia State chief executive bared his mind on Wednesday at the premises of a Federal High Court, Abuja, where he is standing trial over allegations of corrupt practices by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
He accused government of picking and choosing whom to prosecute and whom not to.
His words:, 'I'm being brought here (court) and the man who came to government with N20, 000 is sitting comfortably in a 250 bedroom house in Otta farm. So I cannot understand the two. I came into politics with money and left with nothing.
'When you see what is happening in the country today, I still wonder why I'm here. Because in the National Assembly, people have started revealing what I started talking about many years ago when I said former President Obasanjo is the most corrupt African living on earth.
'I feel sad that the so called EFCC and the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) cannot take Obasanjo and his cronies to court. And I'm still coming here (court) every morning. So I feel very sad.
'EFCC is selective, I do not need to tell you. Do I need to prove it? It is proved already by Nigerians. Is there anything you can equal to what is revealed in the power sector, what is going to be revealed in NNPC, in Ministry of Transport, Agriculture, etc? Obasanjo was just an emperor to himself and to the benefit of his family."
Kalu further accused the EFCC of embarking on hypocrisy and insincerity with respect to the charges against Senator Iyabo Obasanjo Bello, over her alleged involvement in the Ministry of Health N300million scam.
According to him, 'can you tell me that Iyabo Obasanjo can jump the fence, as fat as she is. I cannot even jump the fence. I cannot understand. I want us to be more serious, otherwise the judiciary has to stand up on this issue. Because when the judiciary fails what we would have in the country will be anarchy."
Earlier, counsel to the EFCC, Mr Adebisi Adeniyi, had prayed Justice Adamu Bello to commence fresh hearing of the case against Kalu on the grounds that he was hearing the matter for the first time.
In opposition, counsel to Kalu, Chief Awa Kalu (SAN) contended that 'the case cannot start afresh. My client had been properly arraigned on a 107 count charges
before the court, and hearing has not even started. It is strange for the prosecution to ask for the trial to start afresh because there is a new judge."
Kalu's counsel also asked the court to release his client's travel document so that he could go out of the country for medication.
But Justice Bello, who took over from Justice Binta Nyako, who is on transfer to Lagos, adjourned hearing on the application to Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA) says that with the revelations on the energy sector contracts and allocation of land in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), as they concern former President Olusegun Obasanjo, ex-Abia State governor, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu has been vindicated.
According to a statement by the National Publicity Secretary, Chief Ben Onyechere, the PPA said that while Obasanjo was in power, Kalu raised an alarm over his conduct, regretting that nobody believed the former governor.
The party said that despite allegations against Obasanjo before the expiration of his tenure, the EFCC refused to look into his activities.
It said the fact that the people Obasanjo celebrated, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, former minister of the FCT and Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, former chairman of the EFCC, are now in the eye of the storm shows what transpired in the eight-year rule of the former president.
The statement said: 'The former governor of Abia State, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, had raised an alarm sometime in 2006 elucidating on Obasanjo's numerous crimes. His letter to EFCC on Obasanjo was eventually swept under the carpet and Kalu was rather put on trial, while Obasanjo was given a clean bill.
'Today, Ribadu, El-Rufai and Obasanjo are rather on trial because truth has surfaced. One thing about that Kalu is that he sees tomorrow and prepares properly for it, and this may be one of the reasons for his enormous success.
'Rather than Kalu, El-Rufai, Ribadu and Obasanjo, the three musketeers, are on trial in the public domain. Obasanjo deserves to be arrested by now and I don't know why Yar'Adua is wasting time except for the appeal that is pending in the Supreme Court even at that he would have the support of Nigerians if he arrests and detains Obasanjo because his sins are beyond pardon.
'It is the opinion of PPA as a member of the coalition government that Obasanjo should be arrested and tried for the same reason and more for which he arrested people while in power. The PPA maintains that Yar'Adua will not be taken serious unless Obasanjo is detained."