Atiku Can’t Travel To US Again Over Corruption – The Obasanjo Full Shocking Interview 5 Years Ago Nigeria

After a long break, former President Olusegun Obasanjo and his
deputy, Atiku Abubakar, seem set to renew their hostilities.
Obasanjo is insinuating that ex-Vice President Atiku is corrupt,
saying he was investigated by his administration following alert
from the United States.
He said Nigerians should ask Atiku why he has not visited the
United States since he left office, if he has no case to
answer.
Obasanjo, who bared his mind on why he moved against his deputy in
an interview with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
magazine, Zero Tolerance, said he could not understand why the
anti-graft commission has not taken Atiku to court.
He said he did not at any time instigate former EFCC Chairman Nuhu
Ribadu against Atiku.
Obasanjo said: “Ask Ribadu, if I ever say to him, ‘go do this’.
“No; that is not true. We got a letter from America in June 2006,
listing a number of people to be investigated; Atiku was one of
them and that letter went straight to the EFCC.
“It was just shown to me because they will not be able to
investigate my number two without my saying ‘ok’. So, I said if we
got this letter from America, so be it.
“If we have agreement with FBI, Metropolitan Police and they are
helping us and we are helping them and they write to us and say
these are the people we want you to help us investigate, what do
you think we should do? You as EFCC, what will you do, coincidence
or no coincidence?”
He said Atiku had refused to travel to the United States since he
left office because of alleged corruption.
He went on: “Well, I don’t know what the EFCC has found out about
him, but I don’t know if he can go to America. Do you know? I am
asking you, do you know?
“He travels? Travels to where? To Dubai? Let him go to America and
return to Nigeria.
“Well, I don’t know what the EFCC has found out about him, but I
don’t know if he can go to America. Do you know? I am asking you,
do you know?”
But Atiku could not be reached last night for his reaction. He was
away in China.
His Media Adviser, Mallam Garba Shehu, said: “Turaki (Atiku) is in
China and the time difference is about eight hours. There is no way
I could reach him. You can run your story, we will react later.
Turaki will wish to personally react,” he said.
The ex-President insisted that Ribadu was not his attack dog.
“He is an attack dog to those people who have run foul of the law,
people like (former Vice President) Atiku! He is an attack dog to
take down Tafa Balogun, my own Inspector General of Police? Is that
what you call attack dog?”
He denied influencing a report of the EFCC which led to the
exclusion of some politicians from the 2007 election.
Obasanjo said: “No, no. Yes!. He brought a report to me and said
these people are corrupt; how can I in my position receive a report
that says these people are corrupt, and then I say ‘extol him as a
governor’. Is that the type of leader you want me to be? I will not
be that. So he brought a report; I didn’t ask him to carry out an
investigation; he even came out and said he had found 28 governors
as corrupt.
He said EFCC under Ribadu investigated him while in office to prove
that nobody should be below board in the fight against
corruption.
He said: “I was investigated. I told the EFCC to investigate me. I
told EFCC to carry out a clinical investigation and they did it.
They also did same with all the people on my farm. One of them was
telling me the other day how Lamorde called him three times and
took statements from him.
“The EFCC even made sure that they did not submit that report to
me; they waited until I left and updated their report after going
round the world and saying ‘look; this is the report’. Nobody
should be below board in the fight against corruption.”
Obasanjo, however, became angry when he was asked why EFCC never
moved against a former Chairman of the Nigeria Ports Authority
Chief Olabode George, until when the latter fell out of favour with
him.
He added: “No, no, no; don’t say a thing like that; that is a
stupid statement. I take very strong exception to that and if you
are from EFCC and you say that, I think you should be removed and I
mean it.
“Ribadu brought a report and a blanket report to us and we said,
‘look, if there is something wrong with NPA, you don’t crucify 50
people, go and get the leaders’ and, eventually, he got the leaders
and the leaders happen to be the chairman, the Chief Executive who
is from Kano and they were charged and they went to jail. And it is
in the same report of Ribadu; now, if Ribadu is no longer there and
you want to run him down, it should not be from you and I will not
run him down.”
“I will say where I think Ribadu has gone wrong but where he is
right, and he lifted that organisation, it should be
acknowledged.
“He did very well until he lost his direction when he left. He did
so well that he became a threat even to the incoming
administration; that is what happened. He was so successful that
his success began to be a problem for him.”
Although Obasanjo avoided rating Ribadu, he faulted the appointment
of his successor, Mrs. Farida Waziri as the chairman of EFCC.
He alleged that Mrs. Waziri, was head-hunted by ex-Governor James
Ibori and should not have been given the appointment. Mrs. Waziri
defended this several time, says it was false.
He added: “I don’t know how to score him. I know that the woman
they brought to replace Ribadu (Farida Waziri) was not the right
person for that job, because I understood that one of those who
head-hunted her was James Ibori. If James Ibori, who is now in a
United Kingdom (UK) prison for fraud, head-hunted somebody who will
fight corruption in Nigeria, then you can understand what
happened.
“Well, go and look at her track record, go and look at the
condition or the qualification, go and look at the type of
interaction that anybody holding that job will have with a similar
organisation elsewhere; did Waziri have that type? What connection
did she have with FBI; what relationship did she have with
Metropolitan Police in London; what did she know. It is not a
picnic! While Ribadu was doing it, he was doing it with all his
ability and I believe he did it well.”
He said he would reappoint Ribadu if he has the opportunity.
“Yes, I will reappoint Mallam Ribadu and I will not dismiss him the
way he was dismissed from EFCC and one thing I will tell him, I
will advise him not to go and hobnob with people he had declared as
corrupt. Hobnobbing with such people does not do much credit to his
image.”
Responding to a question, Obasanjo explained why he had been
critical of the Federal Government’s fight against corruption.
He said political will is required to fight corruption in
Nigeria.
But when asked whether the nation still has the political will, the
ex-President simply responded: “Go and ask your president, not
me.
“Political will is the courage, ability, the audacity to do what is
right and most of what is right will not be pleasant.”
He added: “I feel concerned about Nigeria and I will never stop
feeling concerned and that is why occasionally I speak up.
“Even now, I am speaking up to say that all of you in EFCC, there
are areas you should be ashamed of yourselves. If you take an
organisation which took Nigeria from level 2 to level 43 and then
it start coming down to level 34 then something is wrong. You don’t
come and blame that on me; you don’t come and ask me that.”
The Nation.