Posted by The PM News on
The Action Congress (AC) has challenged the federal government to urgently set in motion the process of identifying and prosecuting those involved in the alleged 21 billion naira bribe-for-contract scandal in the nation's Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) project reported by the media last week.
The Action Congress (AC) has challenged the federal government to urgently set in motion the process of identifying and prosecuting those involved in the alleged 21 billion naira bribe-for-contract scandal in the nation's Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) project reported by the media last week.
In a statement issued in Abuja Sunday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said it should not be difficult to fish out those involved, considering that their American collaborator has already pleaded guilty to the crime stemming from the scandal.
It also said the Nigerian investigators would do well to contact the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to assist in identifying the Nigerian officials involved in the scam, said to have spanned the period from 1994 to 2004. AC said the case presented yet another great opportunity for the Yar'Adua administration to show that its anti-corruption war is not a fluke.
'We recall that two other major bribe-for-contract scandals involving US oil service company Wilbros and the German company Siemens have yet to be conclusively investigated, despite the claim by the administration that it would not spare anyone involved in the scandals. Instead, the administration has awarded a fresh contract to Siemens, in contravention of its own ban on the company.
'Now, the LNG bribery scandal, said to have involved top officials of the Nigerian presidency, petroleum resources ministry and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) as well as joint venture oil partners, provides the Yar'Adua administration with yet another chance to show its commitment to the war against corruption.
'If the administration fails to cash in on this opportunity, it would only have succeeded in showing that Nigeria is not serious about fighting corruption; that corruption is pervasive in Nigeria and that indeed there are sacred cows who cannot be affected by the anti-graft war,' AC said. The party said it was high time the country stopped those who seemed to be hell bent on giving Nigeria and her good peoples a bad name in the comity of nations, by identifying, investigating and prosecuting all those involved in the bribe-for-contract scandals.