26 March 2009

The age-long cliche that an accused cannot adjudicate over his case may have been rubbished by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, when he gave himself a clean bill of health over allegations of corruption during his eight year tenure as president of Nigeria.

Obasanjo claimed that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has cleared him of any corrupt practices during his presidency. "What you are doing now is that you are accusing me of corruption. And no one has accused me of corruption and I'm not going to take that from you. Why are you accusing me of corruption? Do you have evidence to back your claims up? Let any body with corruption allegations against my name come out to present it," said Obasanjo.

Obasanjo's statement has apparently rattled many Nigerians who are questioning the premise on which the Owu-born former President arrived at his position of a clean bill of health. He is in fact is being challenged to explain to Nigerians how he came about this unfounded and "dubious" clearance.

Some argue that the former President may have mistaken his new assignment as a mediator in the Congo crisis as clearance, which, according to them, does not have anything to do with Nigeria. Others say that Obasanjo may have arrived at this going by the toothless posturing of the EFCC against former political office holders under his administration.

A Lagos-based activist lawyer, Festus Keyamo says, "I think the spokesman for the EFCC should be the right person to answer that but I am not aware of any clearance. I am not aware of any such investigation that was carried out regarding him. If he is referring to the investigation carried out by Ribadu, then that would be very ridiculous because that would mean he was a judge in his own court. He appointed Ribadu who served under his tenure. So, any clearance given by Ribadu to him would absolutely be ridiculous."

Another Lagos lawyer, Bamidele Aturu appears to be in agreement with Keyamo's position when he said, "the truth of the matter is that Obasanjo is not being prosecuted for him to say that he has been cleared. It is very early to say that, given the fact that he just left office last two years. And when you look at the fact that investigations are still ongoing, I think it is too early to say that he has been cleared by the EFCC or any other anti-corruption agency. You have to remember that under our laws, there is no time-frame for prosecuting crimes; even after 10 or 15 years, an offender can be prosecuted. The EFCC or ICPC cannot give presumptuous clearance to anybody. All they can say is that they don't have anything against him for now."

Obasanjo, who was pelted with rotten tomatoes by the protesting Nigerian students for his alleged wrong acts during his eight years in office in London recently, was born on March 5, 1937 in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital. He was military Head of state earlier before his election as a democrat President on the platform of the Peoples' Democratic Party (PDP), in 1999 which gave him a ticket for re-election in 2003.

Obasanjo holds the national merit Award of Grand Commander of the Federal Republic (GCFR).