Yes, we are so sorry, former president Alhaji Shehu Shagari. On behalf of other Nigerians, I, Tunde Fagbenle, humbly offer our unreserved apologies for our collective folly in misrepresenting your regime of 1979 to 1983 as the limit of rottenness, of brigandage, and of kleptomania any country can suffer, and the worst Nigeria would ever have. What folly!

How could we have known, Mallam Shehu Shagari, that a few decades down the line, precisely 28 years later, a government will come that will make a saint of yours, one that would make all the stealing your team (nay, not you) was accused of look like petty-thieves?
Incidentally, and sadly so, every government we’ve had after the one that overthrew your government – civilian or military –have struggled to outdo each preceding one in the degree of treasury looting and of emasculating the country! And I should list them: General Babangida’s; General Abacha’s; Chief Obasanjo’s; Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua’s; and lastly, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan’s, the one that takes the cake of whom I speak! I have deliberately left out one or two – Chief Ernest Shonekan’s and General Abdulsalami’s – not because they were any cleaner but because they were both too brief (only months) to count, whilst the former, indeed, was deemed null in the eyes of the law!

We called you all sorts of names, Mallam. We, especially, the “Southern” press, looked upon you with loath. We said what happened in your government was because you were a “malla” – the derogatory way those of the Hausa/Fulani stock were called by the foolish ones —; we said it was because you did not have a university degree; we said you were too old and inept; we said many other things against your humble and good-natured self. We branded and hounded your “main men” – the Umaru Dikkos, the Uba Ahmeds, the Adisa Akinloyes, the Joseph Wayas, etc.

O, yes, I remember! We, Nigerians, rejoiced and hailed the military junta that overthrew your government – incidentally, headed by ‘one’ General Muhammadu Buhari – when, Gestapo like, it stretched its tentacles all the way to Britain to kidnap Dr. Umaru Dikko, almost succeeding with getting his drugged body crated onto a plane to Nigeria to answer charges of looting our treasury!

O, yes, I remember! That Buhari’s military government rounded up most of your Ministers and even some politicians in the opposition party and angrily sent many of them (through ‘arrangee’ tribunals) to hundreds of years jail terms each! Still we clapped to show our support for the military “cleansers”, demonstrating the depth of our repulsion with your ousted government.

You would then understand, dear Alhaji Shagari, when fate gave us what our hearts had always yearned for: a President from the minority Niger Delta, young, and a degree holder – not just an ‘ordinary’ graduate but a PhD to boot.

Isn’t there an adage that says one should always be careful what one prays for lest one gets it – in abundance?
But, Sir, how could we, in our wildest dream, have thought that the day would come when those hopes, those expectations, would turn to ashes before our very eyes? How could we have known that it was possible for some people to come into power and get so drunken by it, throwing all caution to the wind, going on the rampage of the national treasury and raping the country with reckless impunity? Yes, that young president said it all: he didn’t “give a damn”!

We are now waking up each day to fresh reports by the EFCC of billions of dollars (you heard me right, US dollars, not just naira) that have been pillaged by all manner of characters in the corridors of power. Mind-boggling figures that defy reasoning. Anyone and everyone that had the slightest connection to those in power partook of the grand bazaar that was the country’s treasury whilst the country ails with death-trap roads, with ludicrous rails, with ignominious power supply, with pitiable hospitals that kill rather than heal, with public schools that are public shame, with citizenry that are dying of poverty in the thousands each passing day!

But nothing beats the revelation of the billions of dollars that reportedly went through the hands of the National Security Adviser – NSA, Sambo Dasuki, a retired military officer and supposedly a prince of the revered Sokoto caliphate. Under the guise of superintending the purchase of arms and weaponry to combat the Boko Haram terrorists, this scoundrel heartlessly embarked on a stealing and booty-sharing spree, turning his office to a Dispensary for all manner of personal and political greed. It didn’t matter that the fighting army had nothing to fight with; it didn’t matter that our poor soldiers were sent to certain death in battlefield, and those that flee, to certain prospect of death sentence for desertion.

The more is found of the grand larceny, the more still exists to be uncovered! As Wole Olaoye, columnist with TRUST newspaper says, Nigerians have to steel themselves for more revelations of the stealing that took place. Steel ourselves before the stoning of those that stole our commonwealth begins! Maybe that is why a judge trying one of the many cases says it is in the interest of the accused to be kept in “protective custody” and not to be granted bail, lest they get lynched by a mad public whose sons have been sent to their untimely death!

By a curious twist of fate, the country has come full circle and, once again, we have the same man, yes, that army general that toppled your government 28 years ago, but whose desire to rid the country of corruption was rudely aborted in a coup by a permissive and complicit military junta. General Buhari (retired) is back in power as a civilian president.

So you can imagine what must be going through President Muhammadu Buhari’s mind. The country is rotten through and through, with no clean spot to stand. But if even half of our stolen wealth can be recovered, and structures and institutions can be strengthened enough to stop further pillage and discourage the impunity of the past, then, indeed, the country may be on the path to recovery and development.

Before then, once again, Alhaji Shehu Shagari, we are sorry; yours was not the limit. And that’s saying it the way it is!

www.punchng.com/president-shagari-please-forgive-us/

Wailers, over to you

Nobody has ever probed any past government in Nigeria except Jonathan's regime. Does that mean the North and West are conspiring to deal with Easterners continuously? I think everyone should be brought to book. Same men in the 60's are still the same in power today.... Chai..

Never again will the likes of GEJ ever lead this nation! It was either he was so clueless as described by the genarality of nigerians, or he was aware and also took part in the mindless and senseless looting of our commonwealth. Thank God for a God-sent, in the person of PMB!

Don't worry, 2019 is around the corner. Past corruption allegations will be a child's play when compared to what APC and Buhari will unleash on Nigeria. If you think the money spent on his campaigns was from the moon, you will soon know the reality when his corrupt backers begin to ask for their Return on Investment. The REMITA/TSA fraud is a tip of the iceberg.

OLADD:
Don't worry, 2019 is around the corner. Past corruption allegations will be a child's play when compared to what APC and Buhari will unleash on Nigeria. If you think the money spent on his campaigns was from the moon, you will soon know the reality when his corrupt backers begin to ask for their Return on Investment. The REMITA/TSA fraud is a tip of the iceberg.

REMITA/TSA fraud only exist in the minds of wailers like you. Nothing like that happened in reality.

Nice article. It's logic what happened under jonathan. Many of his boys saw in him an inexperienced, young civilian president who couldn't hurt a fly let alone send anyone to jail. I might agree with a guy above me who reasons that the scandals we are discovering is because the Jonathan regime is the first to be partially probed. But then do we sweep everything under the carpet? The fact that other regimes were not probed does not alter the fact that the magnitude of fraud being discovered is so severe that you get 50 years imprisonment in Europe and a death sentence in China. The human heart is desperately wicked. I personally do not believe any president we have had is innocent. May God punish Jonathan, obasanjo, Abacha, Ibb , Buhari, all of them.

.

OLADD:
Don't worry, 2019 is around the corner. Past corruption allegations will be a child's play when compared to what APC and Buhari will unleash on Nigeria. If you think the money spent on his campaigns was from the moon, you will soon know the reality when his corrupt backers begin to ask for their Return on Investment. The REMITA/TSA fraud is a tip of the iceberg.

@the bold.

What exactly is the REMITA/TSA fraud?

Is it the fact that the GEJ govt signed the deal in 2012?

Or the fact that the chairman of the company, Christopher Kolade, was also GEJ's SURE-P chairman?

Or the fact that a director of the company, Dr Ernest Ndukwe, was GEJ's NCC vice chairman?

Or the fact that CBN, SYSTEMSPECS and commercial banks all shared the 1% charge?

Or the fact that a Nigerian company deserves to be paid for developing a platform to help us save money?

What exactly is the fraud you're obsessed about?

Wont you beg Dasuki to confess that he bought PMB a private jet from the armsgate so you can have something big to rejoice about?

I hope another govt comes to probe PMB's govt too so that eventually the fear of looting will become ingrained in the minds of the crooks parading as leaders

Jonathan regime was the worst thing that ever happened to Nigeria. Initially we were glad that a south-southerner was going to be the president by divine Providence. We never knew we were going on a long ride of corruption infested regime. I don't know why Buhari or Efcc have not arrested Jonathan.

seunmsg:



REMITA/TSA fraud only exist in the minds of wailers like you. Nothing like that happened in reality.

Oh really? Nothing like fraud happened but the dramatis personae were asked to refund a whopping N8billion. If there wasn't fraud why did the CBN governor deny knowledge of the 1% Fee? Pls try to jettison sentiment and be real for once. Evil is evil whether committed by APC, PDP or APGA.

K

Is this how the dullard will rule, boring media noise to continue demonizing GEJ who has moved to the global stage with his team, while the dullard assemble unqulified local champions and use their rotten media to brush them up??

coolzeal:
Nobody has ever probed any past government in Nigeria except Jonathan's regime. Does that mean the North and West are conspiring to deal with Easterners continuously? I think everyone should be brought to book. Same men in the 60's are still the same in power today.... Chai..

OGAR Weldon!!!
Read the article carefully and think b4 before u comment!
Buharigate/Idiagbon gave Shagari house arrest, nearly all his ministers were jailed.
Those who escaped were been huntered in abroad.
How old are you my brother or just you started following politics and Nigeria history in 21st century?
Do you know they UMAR DIKKO(from Zaria)?
Read, research and think b4 commenting.............................

coolzeal:
Nobody has ever probed any past government in Nigeria except Jonathan's regime. Does that mean the North and West are conspiring to deal with Easterners continuously? I think everyone should be brought to book. Same men in the 60's are still the same in power today.... Chai..

OGAR Weldon!!!
Read the article carefully and think b4 before u comment!
Buharigate/Idiagbon gave Shagari house arrest, nearly all his ministers were jailed.
Those who escaped were been huntered in abroad.
How old are you my brother or just you started following politics and Nigeria history in 21st century?
Do you know they UMAR DIKKO(from Zaria)?
Read, research and think b4 commenting.............................
Be an agent of Good change.
Don't be sentimentalcrat/propagandacrat.............................

coolzeal:
Nobody has ever probed any past government in Nigeria except Jonathan's regime. Does that mean the North and West are conspiring to deal with Easterners continuously? I think everyone should be brought to book. Same men in the 60's are still the same in power today.... Chai..

are u trying to say that dasuki was frame-up? Or gej is innocent