Taju Tijani
Farouk Lawan is not a man I envy. Yes, he may have shifted a huge burden off his petite shoulders the second he submitted his probe report on oil subsidy.
He deserves his 12 weeks of fame! However, the fireworks of persecutions against indicted VIPs, bodies, ministries, agencies, companies, ministers, racketeers, PPPRA, DPR, PPMC, NNPC and raft of looters, who morphed into oil billionaires through staggering corruption in the oil sector, may not happen. The reported emotional scripting of the systemic hyper-corruption of the oil industry is not enough rationalisation to bring culprits to justice.
Why? In Nigeria, that we are soulless thieves shouts so loudly that we do not need any probe to tell us who we are. Pundits, oil analysts, political jobbers, the unemployable louts, angered political opponents and students may call for persecution but their call will be in vain. Lawan’s report is not a shocker. Nigerians have had to stomach far more damaging corruption scandals in the past with all the culprits mocking our justice system.
For instance, James Onanefe Ibori of recent conviction memory was a celebrated billionaire hero in Nigeria. Sorry mate, over here in the UK, Ibori is seen as an absconding money laundering scoundrel. Eventually, the British got their villain and after a fair trial, Ibori was properly stigmatise as a career criminal and sent to a lengthy time in jail on the order of Her Majesty, the Queen. He may remain the only oil billionaire in Nigeria’s history to face charges for his crime. Thanks to British justice.
This is where Farouk’s rational report will become an irritating bundle of both moral and legal burden in the weeks ahead. His recommendations are dead on arrival. The handwriting of the report’s death is already visible on the wall.
This is why: Farouk was quoted as crying out that he and his committee members came under sustained pressure from government, oil barons, fellow Reps, VIPs and oil marketers. Thank God that Farouk disconnected from political solidarity to affirm patriotism and public probity in the face of a monumental national disgrace. What perfidy, what caddishness for President Goodluck Jonathan’s government to attempt to truncate the probe report? That attempt to influence the outcome of the ad-hoc committee is in itself a criminal offence of perjury. Who is the President protecting? He does not need to protect the oil billionaires who funded the passage of his presidential triumph. I can guarantee that no harm shall befall them as long as he sits as the president of Nigeria.
Lawan and his committee members should as a matter of accomplishment enjoy the triumphalism of their assignments. Despite all the odds stacked against them, they managed to draw victory from the jaws of threat, grandstanding, financial inducements and political blackmail. However, I sympathise with the tangible sadness of the committee’s sense of impotence to prosecute. I sympathise more with the apathetic Nigerian public that have maintained a 52-year assault on the fabric of our corruption without success. A tragic national illness of oil corruption that breeds far more billionaires than we can count must naturally produce some villains. Sadly, in Nigeria, you cannot make villains out of billionaires.
In my society, the more money you have, the more corrupt and questionable the source. The more influential you are, the more your chances of buying and making mockery of our justice. Welcome to the land of the untouchable oil billionaires! Our nation will continue to be punished for believing that the prisons are not built for the rich. The rescuing truth from Lawan’s submission is this: any billionaire in Nigeria who amasses his/her wealth through oil committed the gross sin of corruption all the way. His probe findings more than prove this assertion correctly.
Pressure groups can demonstrate, opinion writers can pontificate, beer parlour pundits can raze the beer joint down with shout of justice, even members of the House of Rep can promise full implementation of their recommendations, but the simple fact is, we have lost the will to fight corruption. Nigeria is a failed state in terms of corruption in high places. The key signature values that make a nation great like probity, service, responsibility, accountability, justice and integrity have been effortlessly supplanted by greed, impunity, avarice, an obsession with power, fame and influence.
For in truth, fainthearted President Jonathan has settled for being seen as a politician who is clueless and toothless. Even though he knows that the pillars are crumbling around him, he still carries on as usual rather than aim disproportionate and pitiless attack against the fabric of corruption in our society.
As things now stand, even the most convinced advocates of criminal prosecution for the looters of our subsidy regime know that that is unthinkable. The most obvious reason is this: the pilfering of the oil subsidy may go deeper into heart of the Presidency, National Assembly, House of Rep, Peoples Democratic Party political donors, and if I must confess, these are impenetrable brick walls for the sword of justice to reach. We are not British but Africans who love power and wealth but hate responsibility and sacrifice.
The moral horror being circulated locally and abroad seems to suggest that defrauding the state is cool in Nigeria. No worries, when caught you will only return some of the loot and continue to stand shoulder to shoulder with the high and mighty in a shameless and failed society called Nigeria. According to a news report from The Eagle Online, 68 oil companies have been blacklisted to make refunds in a show of scandalous urgency. These corrupt oil billionares, who pauperised Nigerians by stripping them of their common wealth, will go unpunished because we live in a sick nation where the president is deficient of any reforming or transforming agenda.
The people in Nigeria work for inept, rapacious and selfish lechers with disabling values of probity, integrity and public service. Sadly, in Nigeria, corrupt oil billionaires wield their wealth darkly to manipulate and terrorise people and even to gain unfair advantage over our judges, which then makes any idea of prosecution a grand comedic charade as we have seen in the many bizarre acquittals in our primitive law courts. Well done Lawan. Someday soon a Jerry Rawlings will emerge to sit on our judgement throne.
[email protected].