I have to ask this question
before I go on: What the hell was Hon. Farouk thinking? For a man who I thought
was intelligent, he obviously lacks street smartness. You don’t deal with “cowboys”
without having an ace on you. You don’t dine with the devil without a long
spoon, in fact you shouldn’t even show up for dinner. I have tried to analyze
the recent bribery findings in ten different ways, and Farouk loses out every
time.
My candid opinion is that
whenever you are put in a position to fight corruption especially in a country like
Nigeria, the first thing you ought to do is insulate yourself. By insulation I
mean a complete sequestration from anything that can discredit you while you
hold that office. Mrs. Farida Waziri was right when she said that in Nigeria,
if you try and fight corruption, it would fight you back. To quote the rapper Jay Z, “you don’t bring a
knife to a gun fight”. Mr. Farouk ought to have known he was walking a tight
rope, and should have kept himself from any form of blemish.
After the January fuel subsidy crises
that led to a microscopic look at the oil sector rumored to be arguably the
most corrupt in the world, it became obvious that the fireworks were set to go
off. It was general opinion that the subsidy regime was laden with corruption
at an iniquitous level. Consequently it
would be impossible not to have the so called “cabal” unmasked. The Jonathan administration
was under pressure to offer some credibility to the much professed anticorruption
crusade. And this was the litmus test. This administration has had a poor showing
so far as far as anticorruption campaign is concerned and thus the need to engender
confidence was necessary. Nigeria can never move forward if corrupt people aren’t
put in prison for the simple reason that if corruption is rewarded, and not
punished, it becomes lucrative. Right now, you are more likely to be labeled as
foolish if you are honest.
Let’s try and build a case for Farouk (there is no case but let’s try
anyway)
If we assume that he really did
want to use the money as exhibit against Mr. Femi Otedola, why didn’t he lodge
the money with the CBN? Why the desire to take the initiative against the oil mogul.
If he was so sure people wanted to bribe
him and he was only considering a sensational finale to his remarkable
accomplishment as a crime detective, why didn’t he wait for the “crooks” to
come to him? He would have had a more tenable argument. Second, let’s also assume
he was trained in Quantico at the FBI bureau or worked with Jack Bauer on the
second season of 24, why didn’t he have an alibi. No one knew, not the House
Speaker, not the EFCC chairman, not the CBN governor, not even his partner,
Tony Almieda (wink wink). He went alone, for he works alone.
It may have started like a real
espionage mission but it sure has ended as a freak show from hell. I strongly
believe Farouk legitimately wanted to be a hero but seriously you can’t have
that sort of “cheese” in your house and not be tempted by it. The bible warns us
to be flee from every appearance of evil. Farouk Lawan did not flee. In fact he
embraced it and went to bed with it. And along the way he decided he was going
to keep the money for himself. If that wasn’t the case, Zenon oil wouldn’t have
been expunged from the list. The mere fact that it was originally there and it
was later “amended” and removed by him (Farouk), he and by extension the full
report cannot be said to be credible. Its
common sense, If I know I am going to hurt badly by a repot I would either
attack the legitimacy of the report or attack the credibility of the person who
wrote the report or attack both. We have seen this game before with the power
probe and SEC probe.
It beggars belief that the state
will collaborate with a man under investigation to implicate a man empowered to
conduct the investigation. Common sense suggests
it should be the other round but hey there, this is Nigeria. On the other hand,
Mr. Otedola may as well be the victim of the serial probes by House committees.
The Way Forward
First and foremost, I believe
strongly that Nigeria needs to uphold its institutions and for this reason the House
must bring stiff disciplinary actions against Farouk. Not since the Water Gate
scandal, has an arm of government witnessed this amount of embarrassment that
has come the way of the Lower House. From Patricia Ette, to Hembe and now
Lawan, the House must take deliberate steps to redeem its image. It’s a shame
that such a fine gentleman is being used as a scapegoat but the law must be
seen to work. He should resign honorably and if he won’t he should be removed
by whatever means the law affords. If people begin to see all House members as
corrupt people, our democracy is dead and buried.
Second, this may be farfetched
but something in me hopes the original report would still be implemented. The
whole point of this charade is to discredit the report but we can’t allow
people who stole over 1.6 trillion naira to walk. That would be carnage.
If this probe ends this way I would
never believe a single word the President speaks about anticorruption ever
again. If this were the US, President Obama would have said something by now,
our President’s silence is deafening.
©2012 Otaigbe Itua Ewoigbokhan
Itualive!
