Nigeria’s anti-corruption group, The Coalition Against Corrupt leaders, CACOL, has slammed President Muhammadu Buhari and the Senate “for the ministerial appointment of some of the nominees especially former Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State.”
CACOL had claimed the former governor was not clean and wrote a letter pleading with Buhari to drop him and other questionable nominees.
“A person who has questions to answer was approved by the Senate,” the group’s Chairman, Debo Adeniran said according to Simon Ateba.
According to him, the entire screening exercise was “a joke” and those meant to screen questionable ministerial nominees are also corrupt and could not do much.
“It was a premeditated question and answer session. The moment someone that is meant to be screening starts singing the praises of a candidate, the entire exercise becomes nothing but a joke,” he added.
The senator representing Abia–South senatorial district, Eyinnaya Abaribe, had, during the screening, questioned Fashola over the N78 million spent on his personal website and N139 milion on the drilling of two boreholes. Fashola responded by saying he was not in charge of signing cheques or contract award.
However, Adeniran said, the Senator erred by not being thorough.
“One would have expected that a follow-up question be asked – as to what his responsibilities were, as the chief executive and chief accounting officer of the state if he would not be answerable to monies spent by his administration for whatever purpose.”
He said if Fashola could give such a response, it was unwise for the Senate to see him fit to run a Federal Government ministry.
“The fact that Fashola had been endorsed by the Senate did not imply that he was clean. We would recall that all the corrupt ministers that served under the Peoples Democratic Party, for the entire 16 years, were similarly screened and endorsed by the Senate.
“This is exactly what the late Fela had rightly described as paddy-paddy arrangement. They have had their way but we will continue to have our say. The fact that a person is confirmed by the Senate doesn’t mean he is not corrupt,” he said.
