₦airaland Forum

Vicki 09:
I am older then my bf by 5 years age don't matter to either of us

A police signal to arrest the former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Nuhu Ribadu, and the former minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nasir El-Rufai, has been issued in Abuja from the office of the Inspector General of Police, Ogbonnaya Onovo, according to authoritative police sources.

However, Emmanuel Ojukwu, spokesperson of the police, in a telephone interview with NEXT yesterday said he was unaware of such a signal. "I am just not aware of such a thing and if it is a warrant it is not the duty of the police to issue a warrant. Our job is to obey court orders." However, Peter Adobamen, a lawyer who spoke to NEXT said the police can indeed issue a warrant of arrest on anybody.

This is indeed what appears to have happenned in the case of Mr. El-Rufai and Mr. Ribadu. NEXT investigations in Abuja yesterday revealed that the warrant was issued on November 5, with the instruction for the arrest of both men "on sight". This is coming against the background of Mr. El-Rufai's planned return to Nigeria after a temporary exile in Europe and the United States of America.

Messrs. Ribadu and El-Rufai's difficulties with the police leading to the issuance of the order of arrest, NEXT gathered, are based on an alleged claim that they are conducting treasonable activities abroad.

The Attorney General of the Federation, Michael Aondoakaa, has consistently made the allegation of treason against both men, saying extradition charges will be eventually brought against them. Sources at the Justice Ministry yesterday told NEXT that "dialogue is already ongoing with security institutions to prepare the extradition process."

Ribadu' challenge

The Code of Conduct Tribunal declared the former anti-graft chief, Nuhu Ribadu, a fugitive of the law two weeks ago, claiming he did not declare his assets. In an angry statement of rebuttal, Mr. Ribadu described the order as another episode of what he called the "relentless persecution against me" and wondered how the court that was fully aware of the circumstances under which he left the country, could tag him as a fugitive.

"I had to leave the country on January 3 this year after a relentless persecution which climaxed in two assassination attempts," he said.

El-Rufai's cross

The Attorney-General of the Federation, Mr. Aondoakaa, had said, based on the Senate Committee on FCT's report which allegedly indicted the ex-minister, he had commenced extradition proceedings on Mr El-Rufai.

"In invoking the relevant clauses of the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) between Nigeria and Britain to bring El-Rufai to justice, we need to back our request with relevant documents," Mr. Aondoakaa told the media.

Fighting back

Mr. El-Rufai's lawyer, Robert Amsterdam, has taken the attorney general's threat serious and has published a whitepaper dated December 1, 2009 that seeks to highlight the former minister's innocence.

Mr. Amsterdam, the founding partner of the international law firm, Amsterdam and Peroff, said in a 48-page whitepaper which chronicled the former minister's stewardship as a public servant that he is seeking "to present Nasir El-Rufia and his accomplishments to the world, to summarise the motives behind the attack on his reputation, and to provide ample evidence to prove his innocence of all these libel and slander."

According to Mr. Amsterdam, the publication "marks the formal announcement that we are open and willing to defend Nasir on any platform available with all the facts in front of us". While describing Mr. El-Rufai as a man who holds "ambitious dreams for Nigeria's future", the author stated that all the attack on the former minister are "groundless and without evidence" and "manufacture by a hardworking scandal factory".

In the foreword to the whitepaper, the former Attorney General of Nigeria, Kanu Agabi, described Mr. El-Rufai as "fair-minded, hardworking and unrelenting". "The things that El-Rufai has had to do for the nation are difficult things. He has had to tread upon hard and difficult ground and to do for the nation difficult things" Mr. Agabi said.

Kanu Agabi's testimony

Mr. Agabi further added that Mr. El-Rufai and Mr. Ribadu are agents that will lay "the modern foundations of the rule of law in Nigeria", extolling the work done by the former minister to return the Federal Capital Territory to its master-plan which had suffered what seemed then as irredeemable distortions.

Tracing the roots of Mr. El-Rufai's travails, Mr. Amsterdam recalled that Mr. El-Rufai first wrote himself into the bad books of the powers-that-be when he revealed that the Senate's deputy majority leader, Jonathan Zwingina, and deputy senate president, Ibrahim Mantu, solicited a N54 million bribe for an accelerated confirmation as a minister. According to the author, "the Nigerian Senate as an institution never forgot or forgave him."

The whitepaper also gives a detailed account of Mr. El-Rufai's stewardship as the Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE).

According to the author, while at the BPE, Mr. El-Rufai was profoundly successful. His dedication to his work resulted in his raising N40-50 billion in revenue from the privatisation programme. Despite his successes at the BPE, the leadership of the Nigeria parliaments were not impressed. In March 2002, the author of the whitepaper recalled, the speaker of the House of Representatives then brought a defamation suit against the former minister in response to Mr. El-Rufai's criticism of the Speaker's proposal on what to do with NITEL.

The suit was squashed by the Court of Appeal on June 2, 2003. According to the judgment the legislature can only look into cases of corruption and mismanagement of public funds. This judgment is described by the learned gentleman as posing "an unprecedented challenge to the boundaries of the power of the Legislature in the Nigerian Constitution and the role of the Nigerian Judicial system in reviewing its decisions and actions"

Tarnishing El-Rufai

The whitepaper recounted how the House of Representatives failed in its attempt to blame Mr. El-Rufai for the manner in which NITEL was privatised, through public hearings. On May 25, 2005 the House of Representatives placed a ban on Mr. El-Rufai from holding public office for life. When this was challenged in court, the Federal High Court, Abuja on July 24, 2005 discarded the pronouncement of the house committee.

Recounting Mr. El-Rufai's days as the minister of the FCT, Mr. Amsterdam recalled that the mandate given to him, amongst other things, was to reduce corruption in public administration and to enforce the Abuja Master Plan for urban development tasks, which the former minister approached with unprecedented passion. "El-Rufai implemented a Strategic Development Plan designed to halt and reverse the "Lagosification" of Abuja."

In order to restore the FCT to its Master-Plan, the former minister's work involved the demolition of houses "erected along sewage lines and the restoration of parks which had been parcelled out and allocated to men and women of rank." By this action, he invariably crossed the path of some of the country's elite "accustomed to favouritism".

The whitepaper is of the view that with the expiration of the Obasanjo administration and the assumption of office as president by the former Governor of Katsina State, Umaru Yar'Adua, the authorities started going after certain former Obasanjo officials, with Mr. El-Rufai and Mr. Ribadu at the top of the list.

While describing Mr. El-Rufai as a man who holds "ambitious dreams for Nigeria's future", the author stated that all the attack on the former minister are "groundless and without evidence" and "manufactured by a hardworking scandal factory".

In a surprising move, which is sure to send jitters through the spine of the ruling party, former President and two time Presidential candidate of the ANPP Gen. Muhammadu Buhari has finalized plans to endorse the former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu to contest the upcoming Presidential elections in 2011.

The move, which is rumoured to have been hatched in the residence of the late human rights activist Gani Fawehinmi will see Buhari emerging as the Chairman BOT of the party with Asiwaju Bola Tinubu taking over as substantive party Chairman. Presenting the position of his organization, TBO, Gen Buhari said “this is indeed the time to set aside personal ambitions for the good of the entire country. I, and other eminent Nigerians will campaign through all nooks and cranny’s of the country side-by-side with Mallam Nuhu Ribadu and Babatunde Fashola to ensure we rescue Nigeria from its directionless state.”

Under the proposed administration, Professor Pat Utomi is expected to assume leadership of the Finance Ministry while the current special Adviser to the President on MDG’s, Amina Az-Zubair takes over the Ministry of National Planning. Reknowned nobel laureate Wole Soyinka and Justice Uwais are being considered for the position of INEC Chair. Prominent northern Statesman and former Governor of Kaduna State Mallam Balarabe Musa has described the arrangement as “a masterstroke” and has called on all patriotic elements to unite under the movement for the upliftment of Nigeria. "Nigerians at home and abroad should participate and fund this electoral revolution and let us put our country on a radically different path of progress and development" he added.

Feelers from the candidate, Nuhu Ribadu indicate that if elected, the administration would focus solely on the war against corruption. Buttressing this view, Arc Odu Ahaneku, the party’s youth leader in Imo State said “you don’t redesign your building plans when your workers are stealing the money! You redesign the system that ensures every worker gets his budget and does what he’s supposed to do. Accordingly if elected, we intend to make sure the system is redesigned to correct anomalies in our incentive structure to accelerate service delivery and development.”

Former Senate President Ken Nnamani and Gen. TY Danjuma are also rumoured to play a significant role in the coming months.

~Bluetooth:
@gidson 21
if new york has beggars i dont know since i haven't been there but i doubt it because a developed country like the united state would not want useless people parading its street.

doggyall:
What is c2h5oh?

Sweet T:
I love short women. the shorter the berry the sweeter the juice.

PurestBoy:
Fashola is a big foooooooooooooooollll

Kay 17:
FAshola is an slowpoke, how he got that SAN without contributing to Nigerian jurisprudence is not surprising, corruption is not NEW in Nigeria. do you think mega cities are created by deporting beggars? fashola must have being deceiving you.

brutal:
D poster already knows d right answer. . ."when jungle matured,u go know who be who."most of these women will change when the table turns . . .don't expect a honest response because admitting it publicly gives them a bad social image.

adebayo201:
dat is one of the things i dislike

platinumnk:
Allright. . . funny though. you all are leaving 9ja and Im crying to come back !!!

lagerwhenindoubt:
do you mean the GrandFather Clock of the 80s.

It is in the store somewhere i seriously doubt it works but we have never used it since 1989.

It makes a horrible bong bong bong sound every hour.

Why do you want it.

Lord_Reed:
Did she get more paid than u or your pay dropped?

bornseller:
i have just the pendulum(minus the clock)

i have tested it and yes it passed.

is it still goin 2 fly or must it be the full clock?

i have three.

netotse:
@nethacker
as u dey always quick post your email addy for NL i no wan imagine imagine the amount of spam mail u dey get. . .try dey use (at) instead of @ now. . .

mosho4all:
thanks for your reply,i am 20 year old now,i am apply for sociology,undergraduate,please kindly let me know what to do next.

Raymond247:
Ask her her mission, tell her your mission but if she does'nt want redemption then u give her salvation before it becomes a tempation.

Rhymez:
How do you gals feel when a guy ask you to stop coming to his dwelling?

mosho4all:
PLEASE AM LOOKING FOR YOUR HELP AT THIS STAGE NOW BECAUSE I HAVE BEEN DENIED 3 TIMES LAGOS HERE FOR STUDENT VISA AND I DECIDED TO CHANGE THE SCHOOL TO UNIVERSITY DUE TO MY SCHOOL SAID THEY CANT DEFER MY ADMISSION SO I HAVE TO CHANGE IT FROM COLLEGE TO UNIVERSITY,IS THERE ANYTHING YOU PEOPLES CAN ADVISE ME ON DUE TO AM HAVING ANOTHER APPOINTMENT ON 28TH OF DEC,PLEASE YOU PEOPLE SHOULD HELP ME OUT.


THANKS
MOSHOOD

wems002:
Congrat man, So who is next?, i guess femilangy, wow they are just handing out visa to us on this forum, it should be one of the if not the most productive thread on NL,
Please oyewolejos, can you post your interview the way you can remember so others are going to learn from you, once again congrats.