The Senate leadership in Abuja late on Sunday danced around the indictment of President Umaru Yar Adua’s Principal Private Secretary, David Edevbie, who has been charged in a British court for corruption and money laundering, refusing to take a moral position.
Ike Ekweremadu, Deputy Senate President, speaking to NEXT said he couldn’t comment because “I have contrary information from Thisday” referring to a Sunday story of the paper that the London Metropolitan Police had not declared Mr. Edevbie wanted.
Ekweremadu said that his dilemma was not knowing what to believe when two different papers make dissimilar claims regarding the true legal status of Mr. Edevbie’s situation.
When reminded that the indictment of the president’s aide for corruption and money laundering crimes were already in the public sphere, and is a separate matter from whether Mr. Edevbie was or would be declared wanted or not, he insisted that “what you are saying is speculative” asking that we call the metropolitan police to find out what was already known to the world.
Many leaders of the senate did not respond to phone calls and text messages on the matter, while Victor Ndoma-Egba, vice chairman for the senate Judiciary committee said he could not comment on a matter already in court.
However, Anthony Manzo, vice chairman of the senate committee on information and media who accepts that the charges are “very serious” said they are “still indictments and he [Mr. Edevbie] remains innocent until proven guilty.”
Mr. Manzo stated that although the “official stand of the senate is that we do not condone acts of impropriety,” on the particular case of Mr. Edevbie “the judgement call should be for the president” and that “the president is going to make a determination based on the information available to him.”
Mr. Edevbie, a former Commissioner for Finance (2003 -2005) and later Economic Adviser (2006 – 2007) to James Ibori as governor in Delta state, was named last week Thursday at the Southwark Crown Court in the United Kingdom, in the charge of the sale of V-Mobile telecoms shares by Akwa Ibom State and Delta State, in which about $37.8 million (N5.7 billion) was stolen.
The Metropolitan Police also named Mr. Edevbie in charges which include conspiracy to defraud; forgery and counterfeiting; as well as money laundering. It said further that Mr. Edevbie, alongside Henry Imasekha, another associate of Mr. Ibori, also conspired to conceal and transfer criminal property, about USD10million, to a Nigerian company, controlled by Mr. Imasekha, disguised as a loan.
Official responses from the Presidency were not forthcoming yesterday as Segun Adeniyi, presidential spokesperson did not return phone and text questions.
Mr. Edevbie’s own position about his formal indictment, and the appearance of guilt it conveys for someone who is a presidential aide could not be obtained as he did not respond to repeated calls.
But for a group of Nigerian civil society campaigners, the choice is easy and straightforward, as they asked the president to fire Mr. Edevbie to reassure Nigerians that he really meant his to fight corruption.
Denja Yaqub who is Assistant Secretary of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) said he considered it “scandalous that we need to have the British Metropolitan Police to let us know those who are corrupt in our government” and that the allegations are grave enough to suspend Edevbie while investigation continues.
Mr. Yaq said failure to create a tradition of probity had encouraged public officers to thread the path of corruption. “Even former corrupt governors have not gone to jail, and this is an encouragement for corruption and so those who work for Yar’Adua have also been encouraged” he said.
Yinka Odumakin of the Afenifere Renewal Group [ARG] shared the labour leader’s views, adding that “David Edevbie should resign, the Attorney General of the Federation should also resign because he lied to Nigerians that the EFCC has cleared Ibori, Tinubu and others whereas the EFCC say they haven’t.”
In a sarcastic cut, Mr. Odumakin said: “If people who have been accused of corruption leave Yar’Adua’s government, I don’t think there will be anybody left in the government.”
For Lagos attorney, Bamidele Aturu, however, “the man should not have been appointed in the first place” and since he is already there, “he should be dropped if the government has any integrity.”
Mr. Aturu said “by keeping that man in the executive office of our presidency, we show the world that we are not serious about fighting corruption.”
In a rare public challenge of its supervisory authority, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, last Friday dissociated itself from the clean bill that the attorney general of the federation, Michael Aondoakaa, gave to Mr. Edevbie and others cited in the London charge.
In a clear violation of Nigeria’s treaty obligation, Mr. Aondoakaa had said at a news conference that “As the Attorney General of the Federation, I will not release any Nigerian to a foreign government for prosecution on offences whose ingredients are domicile in the country.”
Section 6 of the EFCC Act, and the United Nations Convention against Corruption, UNCAC, the African Union Treaty against Corruption, as well as the Economic Community of West African State, ECOWAS, convention against corruption, all impose an obligation on Nigeria to cooperate with international partners and countries under our mutual legal assistance treaty.
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