0 2017 Budget Documents Stolen - Senate Alleges ...You'll Be Shock Who Did

The Senate, yesterday, alleged that the Nigeria Police had stolen all documents relating to the processing and passage of the 2017 Appropriation Bill, urging Nigerians to hold the Force responsible for delay in the passage of the bill.

The Senate also directed the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, to as a matter of urgency, return the documents and all electronic gadgets, including computers containing the budget files, which were taken away from the residence of the chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, Danjuma Goje.

This was as the chamber set up an ad hoc committee to investigate the invasion of the Abuja residence of Goje, by the Police last week Thursday. The upper chamber further directed the same committee to investigate the alleged assassination attempt on the Senator representing Kogi West Senatorial District, Dino Melaye.

On the budget, the Senate decided to heap the blame of its failure to pass the budget as earlier scheduled on the Police, following the point of order raised by Goje, alerting the chamber that his residence was raided last week by the Police.

Goje also told the apex legislative chamber that the Police took away files and laptop containing the 2017 budget documents, in addition to carting away monies in naira, dollar and other currencies.

While adopting the presentation made by Goje pertaining to the invasion of his residence last week, the Senate asked the Police to tender public apology to the National Assembly and also return all the allegedly stolen documents to enable the chamber to continue with work on the budget.

The President of the Senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki, told the lawmakers that the Police had informed the Committee on Police Affairs that the operation in Goje’s house was carried out based on wrong information from a whistle blower.

However, Saraki insisted that the Senate would not accept the excuse as he declared that an immediate official explanation must be made to the Red Chamber on the operation.

The members of the ad hoc committee set up to investigate the invasion include Senators Jibrin Barau (APC, Kano State), Isa Misau (APC, Bauchi State), Chukwuka Utazi (PDP, Enugu), David Umoru (APC, Niger State) and Foster Ogola (PDP, Bayelsa West).

In his submission to the Senate, Goje said the policemen took N18 million in addition to $19,000, 4,000 Saudi Riyadh, 18 files and a laptop which contained budget documents from his house during the operation.

He lamented that his family members and himself were thoroughly traumatized in the operation he said lasted for four hours while he was away trying to put reports of the budget together at the National Assembly.

He said: “In addition, they also took my laptop. And to make matters worse, they took 18 files from my office. I am so traumatized now and I don’t know which files are missing, which files are available now. Some of these files have to do with the work I am doing, that is the budget.

“Like I told you, we were holding a meeting on the budget when they came last Thursday. So from Thursday till now, we have not been able to meet because some of the papers are no longer available; many of us are traumatized, my house as a politician is a beehive of activities; people are coming from all over the country to sympathise with me.

I have no time to sit and from today we are trying to start sitting again as appropriations committee to see what we can do with the budget. “I want to apologise to my colleagues that we could not keep to the timetable you gave us to lay the budget yesterday (Tuesday) and to get it passed today (Wednesday); and I think it is not our own fault, it is the fault of the police because the police interfered with the whole of the budget process and I hope Nigerians will not turn out to blackmail the National Assembly because the process were truncated by the police.”

Goje also told the Senate that the Police had not contacted him to explain why his house was invaded; pointing out that he was not yet in the know of the reason behind the action of the Police. Saraki insisted that the Police must give explanations on why it carried out the act without any convincing reasons.

He said: “This matter is a very serious matter as Senator Goje has said; it is now over five days with no statement or comments from the police to tell us why this raid was done or to tell us where these files are which are very important in the appropriation process.

“Sadly, I must tell you distinguished senators, that, informally the chairman of the police committee told me this morning that the police are saying that it is something to do with whistle blower. If the whistle blower misled them, I think the police should apologise not only to him, but to the entire country.”

The Inspector General of Police reportedly visited the Deputy President of the Senate, Dr. Ike Ekweremadu and the Senate leader, Ahmad Lawan, to seek peaceful resolution to the impasse between his establishment and the apex chamber. A source within the Senate told New Telegraph that the IGP had to visit Ekweremadu and Lawan because Saraki refused to see him, in retaliation for his refusal to pick his calls when his men invaded Goje’s house in Abuja.

Also, the House of Representatives yesterday issued a 24-hour ultimatum to Idris to return documents relating to the 2017 appropriation bill seized in Goje’s house.

The lower chamber warned that failure to return the documents would slow down the early passage of the 2017 budget. This followed the adoption of a motion brought by Hon. Abubakar Ahmad Yunusa (APC, Gombe) on the need to check the excesses of security agents with regard to invasion of residences of law abiding citizens.

In adopting the motion, the House resolved to set up an ad hoc committee to invite Idris to appear before it to explain what warranted the invasion of the residences of law abiding citizens.

Similarly, the House mandated its Committee on National Intelligence to investigate the source and actual ownership of the N13 billion recovered from a residential apartment in Lagos by personnel of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

This decision was sequel to a motion on the need to investigate the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) over the N13 billion recovered from an apartment at Osborne Towers in Ikoyi moved by Hon. Babatunde Kolawole.

0 Obasanjo BOMBS Jonathan Again! (You’ll not Believe What He Said This Time)

JONATHAN, FROM BEGINNING, WAS TOO SMALL FOR THE PRESIDENCY – OBASANJO

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has said that former President Goodluck Jonathan from his first days as President showed he  was too small for the office, saying he, Obasanjo, acted more as an opponent of Jonathan than a supporter of Muhammadu Buhari ahead of the 2015 presidential poll.

Ex President Jonathan and Gen. Obasanjo (Rtd)
Obasanjo, who said Jonathan deceived him that he would not give Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke the petroleum portfolio in his cabinet was deceived into believing that he could use money to buy the 2015 presidential election.

Obasanjo in the book, Against the Run of Play: How an Incumbent President was defeated in Nigeria, written by former presidential spokesman, Segun Adeniyi, also revealed that Jonathan was gripped by the fear that Buhari, as president, would jail him or lead him to an early grave.

In the 204-page book, former President Jonathan is himself quoted as saying he could not be held accountable for provocative remarks made by some of his supporters, even as former Senate President, David Mark, is also quoted in the book as alleging that he forewarned the former president about the alleged conspiracy against him in the north but to no avail.

Problems of  minority agitation

Obasanjo in the book is quoted as saying that following Umaru Yar’Adua’s death in 2010, he endorsed Jonathan for the 2011 presidential election principally to solve the problems of minority agitation in Nigeria.

The former President said: “I saw the emergence of Jonathan as an opportunity to solve the problem of minority agitation. The three majority ethnic groups in Nigeria can always sort themselves out but not so for the minority. A good example is my state here in Ogun.

“Despite the best of intentions, nobody from Ogun West has been able to become governor because of this minority issue and it will take a conscious effort to make it happen. So, it was in the context of that I had to plead with prominent people in the North to allow Jonathan run for a term.”

I warned him not to make Diezani petroleum minister

But in a tone laden with regrets, Obasanjo pointed out that there were certain things Jonathan did that fell below his expectations as a former president.

“There were certain decisions taken by Jonathan very early in his administration that pointed to the fact that the office was bigger than him and one of them was the appointment of a petroleum minister,” he said.

According to Obasanjo, he cautioned Jonathan not to appoint Diezani Alison-Madueke to such a sensitive sector but the president ignored his counsel.

“Jonathan gave me the impression that he was not going to give her the portfolio but at the end he did and we can see the consequence. He, of course, knew what he was doing,” Obasanjo stated.

Why I opposed Jonathan

The former president also hinted at what riled him against Jonathan and why he parted ways with him in the run up to the 2015 election, a development which has given the impression that he was actively working in support of Buhari’s candidature. But Obasanjo denied any direct support to Buhari.

He said: “I didn’t join them in supporting Buhari; I joined in opposing Jonathan so Buhari was just a beneficiary of my opposition to Jonathan since my position was AOBJ: meaning Any Option But Jonathan.”,

Obasanjo explained that Jonathan and his handlers believed that they could buy the last election and that they were so arrogant about it that the PDP would print only one nomination form for him and him alone. He said: “If he was wise, he would have yielded the ticket to somebody else in the PDP.”

Jonathan was not really afraid about life after office but Buhari

The former president, who also criticised the role played by the military in the last election, said he suspected that Jonathan was not really afraid about life after office but Buhari, his successor.

“I believe the President’s concern or fear is not about life after office per se, because he and I have had occasions to talk about this both seriously and jovially. I believe the President’s fear is particularly motivated by the person he sees as his likely successor, that is General Buhari. I believe the people would have been telling him that Buhari is a hard man; he would fight corruption and he (Jonathan) may end up in jail if not in the grave,” Obasanjo narrated in the book.

The book also placed the defeat of Jonathan at the 2015 poll on the utterances of those close to the former president, chief among them being his wife, Patience.

The book recalls the allegation by former Niger State Governor, Babangida Aliyu, accusing the former first lady of insulting the North with incendiary language, thereby alienating them from Jonathan during the election.

It quoted Mrs. Jonathan as making a denigrating remark against Almajiri in the north, by saying “Our people no dey born children wey dem no dey count. Our men no dey born throw way for street; we no dey like people from the other side”, an apparent reference to the concept of Almajiri common in the north.

Reminded in the book that some persons close to him, especially Chief Edwin Clark and Asari Dokubo, were rather vocal and provocative in their utterances, Jonathan wondered why he should be held accountable for their personal opinions.

The former president retorted: “Okay,  let us agree for the sake of argument that Chief Clark and the others were offensive, what about those from other ethnic groups who were also making incendiary statement about my person with insinuations about people who wear bowler hats?

“I am not defending whoever may have crossed the line among Ijaw people but let us  be fair, why should I be held accountable for that and you would not hold other leaders accountable for what politicians from their own ethnic groups also said? he queried.

On why Jonathan lost the election, former Senate President, David Mark, said that he saw the defeat coming and had pointed out the unrealistic voting projections made by the party about the North to the former president and the conspiracy against him but he was not taken seriously.

He said Jonathan should have seen the handwriting on the wall and done something about what was pointed out to him but no action was taken.

Mark lamented, “I saw it and at difference times, I pointed out to him and the party that the projections being made by some people around the president about what the voting pattern in the north would were wrong.

“I could see the conspiracy and the gang-up building up in the north against the aspiration of Jonathan but my  voice was drowned out by those who took it for granted that a sitting president, and one from PDP, could not lose,” Mark said.

The former Senate President also mentioned that the former Vice President, Namadi Sambo, was also aware that Jonathan was not strong in the North but apparently had little to say in the campaign to re-elect Jonathan.

“Some people were deceiving the president with the kind of false scenarios they were painting for him. The VP could see the conspiracy but I don’t know how much influence he had on the campaign. Why Jonathan couldn’t see it until it was too late is what I find difficult to understand,” Mark pointed out.

0 Adamawa law makers donates the sum of one million two hundred and fifty thousand to Isa Hamman for Kidney transplant

Adamawa lawmakers have agreed to donate N1. 25 million to Isa Hamma, a patient, who lost his kidney to an operation that, went wrong in a private clinic in Yola.

Newsmen recall that in June 2016, a doctor of a private clinic in Jimeta (name withheld), allegedly conducted a surgery on the victim, a herdsman, removing his kidney in the process.

A member representing Hong Constituency in Adamawa Assembly, Hassan Barguma (Hong-APC), had moved a motion under a “Matter of Urgent Public Importance” in February to seek assistance for the patient.
House of Representatives

0 Senate holds valedictory session today in honour of late Senator Adeleke

Saraki urges senators to always relax because of stress

By Henry Umoru, Emman Ovuakporie & Johnbosco Agbakwuru

ABUJA—THE Senate will today hold a valedictory session for late Senator Isiaka, Adeleke (APC, Osun West), who died last Sunday.

The Senate observed a minute silence in his honour, just as the lawmakers in honour of their deceased colleague, suspended all other businesses at yesterday’s plenary and subsequently went for the signing of the condolence register.