The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has slammed President Muhammadu Buhari over a memo by Abubakar Malami, the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice alleging insubordination and diversion of recovered assets by Ibrahim Magu, acting Chairman of the Economics and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)of financial scam.
Kola Ologbondiyan, National Publicity Secretary of the PDP in n a statement said the memo on Magu has exposed the hypocrisy, abysmal corruption, and deception that pervade the Buhari’s administration.
The opposition party called on the acting EFCC chairman to immediately step aside and submit himself for an independent investigation in order to clear his name.
The PDP argued that, based on the allegation of diversion of recovered funds coming from the nation’s Attorney General, the EFCC Chairman has lost all moral rectitude to preside over the nation’s anti-corruption agency to investigate and prosecute others until he comes clean of these ‘horrible allegations.’
It noted that that it was the worst national embarrassment in the history of Nigeria, that the head of anti-corruption agency in an administration that prides itself on zero tolerance for corruption, was being dragged on allegation of diversion of recovered funds and fraudulent sale of assets seized by the agency.
The PDP further stated that Malami’s memo had also exposed the credentials of President Buhari’s anti-corruption architecture, rubbished his standing as Africa Union (AU) anti-corruption champion and shattered Nigeria’s national integrity in the international arena.
”The world can now see that the much hyped anti-corruption fight of Buhari administration, has been nothing but a huge fraud and a racket by certain persons in the APC administration to harass political opponents, intimidate and extort money from innocent Nigerians and steal public funds,” part of the statement read.
The party stated that itself, Nigerians and members of the international community have completely lost confidence in President Buhari’s capacity to fight corruption as he has not demonstrated the littlest effort against corruption since he came into office in 2015, also adding the world have further seen why corruption has worsened his administration.
It added that the president had continued to run a system that condones corrupt practices by officials of his administration while providing cover for individuals indicted for corruption including those who are now serving as cabinet ministers and other federal appointees in his government.
The PDP recalled that President Buhari had insisted on Magu as the EFCC Chairman despite his rejection by the Senate over reports by the Department of State Services (DSS), which raised certain integrity issues against him.
The party further recalled that the DSS report, which was read out on the floor of the Senate allegedly stated that “Magu has failed the integrity test and will eventually constitute a liability to the anti-corruption stand of the current government”.
”Our party therefore holds the latest report coming from none other than the Attorney General of the Federation; the EFCC’s supervising minister, who believably has unhindered access to facts and documents related to the anti-graft issues,… must be received by President Buhari as a huge demand on him to clean up the system.
”PDP therefore charged the National Assembly to immediately constitute a joint ad-hoc committee and commence an independent investigation into these alleged acts which it described as disgraceful which it said has the potency of collapsing the nation’s integrity before the comity of nations.”