Posted by By Kola Ologbondiyan on
President Olusegun Oba-sanjo yesterday paid a surprise visit to the campaign office of Vice President Atiku Abubakar situated at Jabi, Utako District, Abuja.
柊tiku: Ojo panel acted President's script
President Olusegun Oba-sanjo yesterday paid a surprise visit to the campaign office of Vice President Atiku Abubakar situated at Jabi, Utako District, Abuja. According to members of the Atiku Campaign Organisation, prior to the visit, heavy presence of security personnel consisting of police officers, State Security Services (SSS) as well as men of the Nigerian Civil Defence Corps was noticed around the office. The organisation yesterday in reaction to the unscheduled visit to the office, said it raised fresh fears about the safety of its members.
The campaign, in a statement signed by the head of its media team, Mallam Garba Shehu, said Obasanjo, at mid day, slowed down his convoy and spent some moments observing the one-storey building that houses the Media Resource Centre of its campaign organisation. "The dispatch rider of Mr. President stopped in front of the building, allowing Mr. President to make a snap observation of the building. He drove away shortly after," Shehu quoted one of the private security guards at the building as saying.
He noted that the campaign office had been on edge for the past two weeks after men of the State Security Service (SSS) invaded the Political Resource Centre of the Campaign Organization, located in the Asokoro area of Abuja. "The Atiku Abubakar Presidential Campaign would like to alert the public over this unwarranted and crude intimidation. Should anything evil happen to members of the campaign, the Nigerian Pubic should know whom to hold responsible," Shehu said.
He added that the campaign will continue to defend Atiku against officially sponsored smear campaign and on-going efforts to undermine democracy in Nigeria. The campaign has duly notified the International Community about the impending onslaught on the campaign office, he said. Shehu, who also pooh-poohed the report of the five-man administrative panel set up by Obasanjo and headed by the Attorney-General and Justice Minister, Mr. Bayo Ojo, which adjudged Atiku as indicted of abusing his office, saying the conclusions drawn by the panel were predictable.
"The ministers acted out a script authored by a vindictive President who is eager to get his pound of flesh over his third term loss by barring the Vice President Atiku Abubakar, from next year's presidential race," Shehu said. According to him, while it is true that Section 137 (i) of the Constitution makes the simple requirement of an indictment for a fraudulent offence as a basis for barring a candidate from elections by the electoral commission, it is also very clear about who has the power to indict in the law. For such indictment to be valid in Nigerian laws, it must come from either a court of law, a tribunal or an administrative panel set up by the laws. It is important to underscore the fact that lately, there has been a frenzy around the President and many of his appointees about who and who will not be allowed to contest elections in the country.
"Again, we state that this sacred power lies with the Nigerian people who constitute the electorate that have the right to determine who governs them. This inalienable right cannot be appropriated by any individual or group of people. Nigeria remains a country governed by law." Contending that Ojo's Administrative Panel is not a creation of the law, but an adhoc panel put together for a hatchet job by the President, Shehu argued that the purported indictment of the Vice President is not in anyway different from an indictment by the Lagos State Butchers Association, assuming a thing like that could come from it.
"It is also important to state here that the so-called panel headed by Ojo is incompetent in law and procedure to interrogate or question the Vice President on any administrative issue as is being suggested. The Vice President agreed to meet this adhoc panel out of courtesy, and he merely exchanged views with them in an atmosphere marked by cordiality and respect. Ordinarily, ministers are his underlings. Subordinates cannot sit in judgment over their employers. If for instance the President were to go on leave and the Vice President is acting in that capacity, he can hire and fire ministers. This panel is therefore unknown to the law. It is uncharitable, false and malicious for the panel to have concluded that the Vice President abused his office by authorizing the placement of deposits at Equitorial Trust Bank (ETB) and Trans International Bank (TIB)."
Shehu noted that, the deposits were placed in the two banks at the request of the Executive Secretary of Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) and approved by the President and the Accountant-General. "The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the administrative panel could not establish any pecuniary benefits accruing to the Vice President from the placements. How then could the panel have concluded that the Vice President abused his office?"