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| Ex-NSA, Col Sambo Dasuki (rtd.) |
President Muhammadu
Buhari on Tuesday ordered the arrest of the former president's national
security adviser for allegedly stealing more than US$2 billion meant to
purchase weapons for the military to fight Islamic militant Boko Haram rebels. "Thousands of
needless Nigerian deaths would have been avoided" if the money had been
properly spent, Femi Adesina, an adviser to President Muhammadu Buhari, said in
a statement.
It
accuses Sambo Dasuki, a key adviser to former President Goodluck Jonathan, of
awarding "phantom contracts" to buy 12 helicopters, four fighter
jets, and bombs and ammunition worth US$2 billion that never were supplied.
Dasuki
also got the Central Bank to transfer US$142.6 million to a company with
accounts in the United States, the United Kingdom and in West Africa for
unknown purposes and without contracts, Adesina said.
Associated Press report continues:
Dasuki
denied any wrongdoing in an interview Tuesday night with the PR Nigeria news
agency, and said he was proud that in the final months under his watch
Nigeria's military ousted Boko Haram from a self-declared Islamic caliphate set
up after the rebels had taken control of a large swath of northeast Nigeria.
The
offensive came as Jonathan faced elections. Last year, soldiers told the AP
they were going into battle without food and armed with only 30 bullets each.
The
State Security Service has kept Dasuki under house arrest for more than a week
despite a Federal High Court order allowing him to travel abroad for medical
care. The court had allowed Dasuki bail after he pleaded innocent to other
charges of money-laundering, involving more than US$423,000 found in cash, and
illegal possession of arms seized at two of his homes.
The
State Security Service, an agency formerly under Dasuki's control, said he
refused to answer questions about arms deals — charges Dasuki denied Tuesday.
Social
media buzzed with comments about revenge and pay-back. Dasuki is said to have
arrested Buhari, a former military dictator who seized power from a
democratically elected government, when he was ousted in a palace coup in 1985.
Tuesday's
development follows an interim report by a presidential committee investigating
arms procurement, part of the fight against Nigeria's endemic corruption that
Buhari has waged since taking office in May after defeating Jonathan in
elections.
Dasuki,
60, had usurped the role of the Ministry of Defense in procuring weapons. He
was called before a Senate committee last year to explain South Africa's
seizure of US$9.3 million in cash from a private Nigerian jet that landed in
Johannesburg and a US$5.7 million bank transfer that South Africa said involved
an illegal arms deal. Dasuki said the deals were legitimate.
Dasuki,
a retired army lieutenant-colonel, participated in every coup in Nigeria going
back to the 1980s
Adesina says Buhari has
also ordered the arrest of several others linked to the scandal.
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