The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to take the full responsibility and explain the whereabouts of the alleged missing $1b for arms purchase.
It equally charged the National Security Adviser, General Babagana Monguno (rtd) to commence a system wide investigation, as well as place certain All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders and their cronies in the Presidency under watch to ensure that none of them escape from the country to evade justice.
Monguno had declared on Friday that he was quoted out of context, following widespread publicity given to his earlier interview with the BBC in which he was reported to have disclosed that the $1b released for purchase of arms was missing.
The PDP, in a statement by its national publicity secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, advised that “beyond the on-going investigation in the House of Representatives, there should also be a joint public hearing of the National Assembly to investigate the whereabouts of the $1b, as well as other monies meant for security purposes under President Buhari’s watch.”
The party said the NSA’s fresh revelation only goes to further validate the anxieties in the public space that the money, which was in 2017 taken from the national coffers without appropriation, has since been diverted to private purses of corrupt APC leaders and the criminal cabal in the Buhari Presidency.
It claimed that the NSA’s revelation “leaves no one in doubt that the Buhari Presidency has become a parlour of corruption for fraudsters, criminal cabals and treasury looters, who have been pillaging our national coffers under executive cover.
“Nigerians could see how officials of the Buhari Presidency have been struggling to divert attention from this huge swindle, by claiming that the money was spent for the purchase of 12 Super Tucano planes, which it also claimed would be delivered in 2020, only for the NSA to now declare that the entire fund cannot be traced.
“Four years down the line, nobody has seen the Super Tucano planes and no explanation has been given by the Buhari Presidency over the whereabouts of the money.
“It is, indeed, shameful that President Muhammadu Buhari is presiding over a security architecture where funds provided by his Presidency for purchase of arms has vanished into thin air, while our citizens and gallant troops in the front are left at the mercies of terrorists and insurgents.”