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President
Muhammadu buhari
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There were indications
over the weekend that President Muhammadu buhari’s anti-corruption war is being
revved up as investigations closed-in on another confidant of President
Goodluck Jonathan. The
on-going investigations border on some scandalous deals in the petroleum
industry regarding Offshore Processing Agreements, OPAs, whereby crude
oil, worth billions of naira, was given to traders in exchange for refined
imported products – specifically, Premium Motor Spirit, PMS, also known as
petrol, as well as the illegal use of diplomatic passports by some individuals
to engage in illegal foreign exchange movements.
Sunday
Vanguard investigations also revealed that the presidential directive issued
last month, instructing the Nigeria Immigration Service, NIS, to withdraw
diplomatic passports from some individuals, who are no longer in service, was a
swift move by the Buhari Presidency to forestall what a source described
as the “the continued use of the passports by some dirty individuals to smuggle
foreign exchange out of the country”.
Vanguard report continues:
Meanwhile,
the trial of some of “those believed to have illegally benefited from petroleum
subsidy would resume with Buhari determined to ensure that monies stolen from
the treasury of the Federal Government of Nigeria, FGN, would be recovered”, a
Presidency source disclosed to Sunday Vanguard.
We
were also made to understand that the outcry by the immediate past Governor of
the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, who now occupies the position of Emir of
Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, regarding tens of billions of dollars that were
missing, can be linked to some powerful individuals who walked Aso Rock
Presidential Villa freely.
Oil deals
Some
documents sighted by Sunday Vanguard, regarding the activities of some persons
known to have enjoyed the confidence of the Villa, showed the intricate web of
conspiracy for the purpose of milking the Nigerian state.
Two
companies (names withheld), used principally for some of the deals which saw
Nigeria losing billions of dollars through oil deals and whose addresses are
the same, located in Victoria Island, were directly linked to the Presidency.
Presidency
officials during the Jonathan administration had argued that the selection of
one of the companies was based purely on merit and that it was not fronting for
anyone.
But
one of the promoters of one of the companies, who featured prominently in the
“SWISS TRADERS’ OPAQUE DEALS IN NIGERIA,” is said to have had familial links
with one of the confidants of the former President who got him appointed
into one of the Multi-National Commissions/Joint Development Authorities, JDAs,
that Nigeria had with one of its neighbours.
It
was learnt that some of the directors of the Commissions/JDAs carry diplomatic
passports.
The
companies were, according to a source, used “to engage in all manner of oil
deals some of which did not enjoy the benefit of due process but were anchored
and driven from the Presidency”.
Sunday
Vanguard gathered that the CBN’s directive on the deposit of foreign currencies
into domiciliary accounts in Nigeria was a function of the realization by the
Buhari Presidency that huge sums of forex were being warehoused by some
individuals who had direct access to the Villa in the last dispensation.
Indeed,
a few of those who were said to have been intercepted while trying to take
millions of dollars abroad were described by a Presidency source as “having
direct links to Aso Rock in the last administration”.
This
is a different leg of the investigation into the corruption allegedly allowed
to fester by the Jonathan Presidency, totally different from the former
Petroleum Minister, Diezani Allison-Madueke.
Acting
on a petition before it, Sunday Vanguard was informed by the Presidency source
that “a lot of terrible things were discovered to have happened, especially in
the last days of the last administration, but Mr. President is acting on some
of the information while investigations are on-going”.
The source added: “Those
close to the Villa in the last dispensation and known to be involved are being
zeroed-in on.”
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