By Bashir Mohammed Kano

Executive Director, Centre For Information Technology and Development (CITAD), Dr. Yunusa Zakari Yau, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to treat all pending cases of sharp corrupt practices without prejudice adding that  the Secretary to the Federal Government, Mr. Babachir Lawal, was not a scapegoat in the fight against corruption.
Speaking at a press conference in Kano yesterday, Yau said there were three issues about the secretary to the federal government “first of which was cutting grassing in the face of thousands of Internally Displaced Persons starving to death for lack of food in their possession.”

Yau said the Babachir saga was no less different from the case of the former National Security Advisor who diverted money meant for buying arms to fight the Boko Haram militias, stressing that the Babachir issue was enough for a regime of probity and commitment to show him the way out.
He said the magnitude of the money allegedly diverted by the secretary to the federal government in the name of addressing the needs of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) was a classic case of inflating figures, stressing that the money could have saved the lives of many IDPs wallowing in misery, hunger and deprivation.

He said: “On the strength of these arguments, we had expected the President to have asked Babachir to step down and wait until investigations have cleared him of any wrongdoing.
“Failure to do this has sent a very strong signal that the President anti-corruption fight is politically motivated and not anchored on the spirit of national interest. This would be sad for someone who has made a name as a man of integrity, committed to fighting corruption wherever.”

On the humanitarian crisis rocking the Internally Displaced Persons, the CITAD boss said several credible reports had surfaced in the last couple of weeks detailing the ranging calamitous starvation the IDPs were facing and dying for, pointing out that the country was ill-prepared to handle the disaster.
He called on the President to suspend Mr. Babachir Lawal from office to enable to face thorough investigation, stressing that “by effecting such a decision, the nation can be assured that he truly belongs to all and not to some people and was committed to combating corruption wherever and by whoever.”

http://www.blueprint.ng/babachir-not-scapegoat-in-anti-graft-fight-citad/

By Mustapha Usman, Kano

The Centre for Information Technology and Development, CITAD, has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to suspend the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal, pending the completion of investigation on the allegations of corruption against him.

The SGF came under fire for allegedly awarding contract to his own company, RholaVision Engineering LTD, to clear ‘invasive plant species’.

Addressing journalists at the CITAD’s office in Kano on Monday, the Executive Secretary of CITAD, Yunusa Ya’u, alleged that the funds believed to have been diverted by the SGF were meant for the Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs.

According to Mr Ya’u, the ‘grass-cutting’ contract was awarded by the SGF at the expense of the IDPs who were dying on daily basis due to starvation.

He labelled the contract as a misplacement of priority and a clear case of misappropriation of funds.

A group, Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD), has urged the Presidency to suspend the Secretary to Government of the Federation (SGF), Lawal Babachir, over alleged diversion of funds meant for the rebuilding of the North-East.

Executive Director of CITAD, Yunusa Zakari Ya’u, at a press briefing in Kano yesterday, said that the Presidency was not handling the corruption accusation within its kitchen cabinet with seriousness despite the weighty evidence against the SGF by the Senate.

CITAD Asks Buhari to Sack SGF Immediately

The fear that President Buhari has made the most mistake by trying to save his aides in relation to their perceived corruption appear to be catching on as a major civil society organisation at the heart of the reconstruction of the North East has asked President Buhari to suspend Babachir Lawal, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, from office forthwith so as to face thorough investigation. It has also called on the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice to hand over the file to both the EFCC and ICPC and implore Babachir himself to honorably resign until he has been cleared by competent agencies. The Kano based Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) told a press conference in Kano that President Buhari is acting out of character in the handling of the SGF’s case and called on him to rethink his handling of the particular case. Otherwise, said CITAD, it would be a self-indictment as far as the president’s words at his inauguration that “he belongs to no one” is concerned. “The indication now is that he belongs to some people who, by his action, can be shielded from consequence of their corrupt acts”, said CITAD which is running an observatory on the plight of IDPs and the reconstruction process of the north east.

CITAD is justifying its stand on how misplaced cutting grasses in the face of thousands of IDPs starving to death for lack of food was. Two, it says there is no difference between the misappropriation involved and that of the former NSA who allegedly diverted money meant for buying arms to fight Boko Haram insurgency to buying votes the second term bid of former President Goodluck Jonathan. “We think this alone is enough for a regime of probity and commitment to the reconstruction of the North East to show the SGF the way out”, insisted CITAD at the press conference addressed by Malam Yunusa Y’au, its Executive Director.

Beyond the comparison, the NGO listed the magnitude of money involved when compared to the purported work done and said a case of inflation of figure could be established that makes the SGF to, in its view, be involved in corruption proper. It, therefore, regrets that the president whose name has been associated with probity is shielding the SGF from prosecution, indeed rewarding him by retaining him at the office of the SGF.

Hanging its case on the above points, CITAD said any option other than asking Babachir to step down and wait until investigations cleared him sends a very strong wrong signal that the anti-corruption agenda of the regime is politically motivated rather than on national interests. Though leaving no one in doubt of its firm support for the anti-corruption war, it demands treatment of all corruption cases the same way. Contrasting the treatment of the SGF to the arrest, detention, interrogation and investigation by the EFCC of many people suspected of corrupt acts, it wondered why the President has simply opted not to do allow the same in this case. Arguing that the fact of the contract has been well established by the Senate Adhoc Committee on Mounting Humanitarian Crisis in the North East, CITAD interrogated the president’s reasons why he could not go along with the Senate, saying that Babachir was not only given fair hearing, the report of the Senate Committee was signed by adequate number of persons. “It is curious that the same presidency that ordered the invasion of the houses of Judges suspected of corruption who were never given any hearing could now deploy the argument of fair hearing to protect Babachir”, it thundered.

In a retrospective insight, CITAD alleged that, for whatever reasons that became known only later, the SGF had stalled the inauguration of Presidential Committee on North East Initiative (PCNE) and instead the office took it upon itself to directly run the humanitarian programmes that PCNE should do, using the money left by the Presidential Initiative on North East (PINE). It further claimed that the Office of the SGF decided to go into a spending spree in order to exhaust the money available when pressure on the need to inaugurate PCNE mounted, saying that was when award of contracts described as frivolous started. “One of these was the over N200 million to clear ‘invasive plant specie’ in Yobe State to company belonging to the SGF, Lawal D. Babachir”, CITAD stated.

Going further, the NGO pointed out how it is now an understatement to say that a major humanitarian crisis has befallen the management of internally displaced persons (IDPs). Locating the assertion in the number of reports it says have surfaced in the last couple of weeks detailing the range of “calamitous starvation thousands of IDPS dying for lack of food”, the organisation traces what it calls avoidable calamity to three related factors: First, the country was ill prepared to handle a disaster of that magnitude, lacking in the necessary institutions and structures to attend to IDPs need. Second is the inhuman diversion of food and other humanitarian needs of IDPs by callow government officials. Third is the mega corruption in the massive stealing of money meant for addressing the needs of IDPs”. It, therefore, thinks that if corruption is not properly addressed, they whole Buhari Plan for the rebuilding of the north east would come to nothing.

Reactions to the clearance of Babachir by Presidential fiat would have shown the president that any perception of coloration of the anti-corruption war by politics or by double standard will ruin both the Buhari Presidency as well as the anti-corruption war. The world watches and waits for the next turn in the dynamics of the echoes of a war foretold

CITAD Asks Buhari to Sack SGF Immediately