Tayo Oke
Two weeks ago, November 8, 2021, Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court, Abuja, sentenced the former Chairman of the defunct Pension Reform Task Team, Mr. Abdulrasheed Maina, to a total of 61 years imprisonment for embezzling more than N2bn of Nigerian pensioners’ funds, “most of whom have died without reaping the fruits of their labour,” the judge opined. In a country where the big guys are rarely prosecuted for grand larceny, let alone convicted, it generated significant shock waves, topping the news headlines for several days. Could it be that Nigeria is finally ready to throw the books at pilfering government officials and other politically exposed persons as due? People wondered in incredulity and restrained optimism. Those in the know, however, know there is more to the sentence than meets the eye. For a start, Maina is not going to serve 61 years in jail, far from it. He was convicted and sentenced to a series of prison terms on twelve counts, all of which are to run concurrently. The highest of the sentences being eight years, it means, in effect, that his actual prison sentence is also eight years, starting from the time he was arraigned in October 2019. That also means that he has only five years left out of the eight. And, with ‘good behaviour’ and compassion on ‘health’ grounds, he may be out in two years.
Note also that Maina is a VIP prisoner; every prison officer’s favourite inmate in fact. The presence of such a loaded and highly connected individual is coveted by correctional institutions all over the country. He will be treated more like a ‘guest’ than a common criminal. As was shown on TV, there was even a tussle between the agents of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and that of the prison authority over who should have the privilege of keeping him in jail. That speaks volumes.
It was former President Goodluck Jonathan, who wanted a competent hand to clean up “the mess” in the pension administration. He set up the PRTT and appointed Maina, a middle-ranking civil servant, as its Chairman back in 2010. Barely a couple of years into his tenure, it was discovered that Maina was not the competent hand recommended to the president. He had been busy syphoning money from the pension pot he was hired to rescue.
He was dismissed from service and disappeared from view in 2013. The matter became a hot button political issue in the background as the 2014 presidential campaign got underway. Once the regime of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), took over in 2015, important figures around him took various positions on the Maina ‘matter’. The then acting head of the EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, appointed by Buhari, chose the warpath, promptly declaring Maina wanted. Meanwhile, Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, opted for a peaceful resolution. Maina had made secret contact with him, asking to meet up at his hideout for some juicy revelations implicating some important figures in the land. Malami defied the EFCC and indeed travelled to Dubai in 2017, where he met Maina (a fugitive from the law) under four eyes. Malami claimed he had obtained clearance for his nocturnal jaw-jaw with Maina, not from the investigating body, the EFCC, but from the Department of State Security. The irony was totally lost on him that he was the chief law enforcement officer for the regime and should have advised Maina to give himself up first. Needless to say, Malami’s faux pas unsettled Magu and the EFCC, as Maina sneaked back into the country, re-absorbed into the civil service with promotion to “Director” and backdated pay. The then Head of the Civil Service, Madam Winifred Oyo-Ita, claimed she “warned” the president against reinstating Maina but the then Chief of Staff to the President, the late Abba Kyari, pointed the accusing finger at her, claiming she, in fact, had signed off on it. It gets worse.
With this turn of events, EFCC rallied the other security agencies in a seemingly coordinated fashion and promptly re-declared Maina wanted against the wish of the AGF. Unbeknown to Magu, however, a senior member of his own team had surreptitiously removed Maina’s name from the wanted list, which then allowed him to approach the DSS for “protection”, which was granted! Consequent upon this, he ‘escaped’ and vanished into thin air. Not to be outdone by any of this, the National Assembly’s Combined Committees on Public Service, Internal Affairs, Anti-Corruption, Establishment and Judiciary decided, separately and pari passu, to probe the whole shenanigan in late 2017, including Malami’s role in it. Malami subsequently rushed an ex-parte (without notice) application to court to halt the probe as it was “outside the competence” of the National Assembly. Imagine, a probe of official corruption being outside the competence of lawmakers? What type of Attorney General, and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria would suggest that? Anyway, it was a cheeky submission, which the court rightly rejected. He was directed to go and put the lawmakers on proper notice. (See Maina: Villain or fall guy? The PUNCH, January 16, 2018).
As this was threatening to snowball onto the presidency itself, Buhari was quickly advised to order Maina’s removal from the civil service. All kinds of finger-pointing and recriminations started flying all over various government departments and agencies. EFCC subsequently re-arraigned Maina in October 2019. Meanwhile, Malami had decided to throw Magu to the wolves, accusing him of “diversion of recovered loot” and that the EFCC boss had become “reckless, and a liability to anti-corruption war,” forcing Buhari to order his removal from office in 2020.
Whoever doubted Malami’s presence (and power) in the regime should remember this: Malami is the same Attorney General who got himself embroiled in the Malabu oil scandal (OPL 245) when he wrote to the president asking for the probe of former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke, and others to be dropped as it was not in the “national interest”.
Moreover, the two banks alleged to have facilitated the wire fraud in the case, UBA and Fidelity, were also not joined in the case by the prosecution. The judge actually pointed this out in his summation as a glaring omission. Incompetent or compromised prosecution? You decide. Somehow, it was all Maina alone, and no one else.
So, what about the report of the probe by the all-powerful combined committee of the National Assembly? Gathering dust. Where is the report on Magu’s removal and the corruption probe instigated by Malami? Locked away in the vaults. And, what about complicity by the civil service, security agencies and, most importantly, the Attorney General of the Federation? Gone with the winds. Nigeria used to have a crop of fearless investigative journalists. Where are they now? Lying low, and bricking it.
They have allowed the public to be hoodwinked by the spurious sentence. Maina, if you are reading this, and would like to spill the proverbial beans, and tell your story in a book, get in touch. Would gladly do it for free. And, watch this space, readers, the jail sentence on Maina is not the last word in this theatre of the absurd, the denouement will appear on stage soon enough.
tayooke@gmail.com
