Ba a rabu da Bukar ba…. FCT Minister

Those of us who read the concluding part of the Abuja Investment company saga, were amazed to find out about the extent of greed and the brazen display of corruption committed by the Interim management of the company, just a month after their appointment.  In the news story, which was published last Monday, September 25th, […]

Those of us who read the concluding part of the Abuja Investment company saga, were amazed to find out about the extent of greed and the brazen display of corruption committed by the Interim management of the company, just a month after their appointment. 

In the news story, which was published last Monday, September 25th, we learnt that the FCT minister, Muhammad Musa Bello had directed members of the interim management team to refund the sum of N46 million they paid themselves as salary in the months of June and July. And to reinstate four senior staff of the company they reportedly sacked, because they believed they were behind leaking the story of the incredible pay-package to the public. 

What is incredible about this ministerial directive is that it came just weeks after the Interim Management had forced Daily Trust newspaper to retract the story published earlier, which disclosed the unlawful sacking of the alleged whistleblowers and the reason they were sacked. Now we know how far the Dr Bashir Isyaku-led team was willing to go, in order to cover their dishonest tracks.

What is amazing, is how the FCT administration thinks all that is needed is for the interim management to refund their Malaysian pay package and henceforth settle for a miserly (?) half a million monthly, and all will be forgotten. But how can this be, when these people were brought in to, ostensibly, sanitize the system because the former management was adjudged to be corrupt and had been reported to the EFCC?

How could these supposedly morally-upright team end up paying themselves much more than was ever paid for the whole staff of Abuja Investment Company Ltd (AICL) and yet be treated with kid gloves?

According to the September 25th report, the total pay roll of AICL, under the former management was only N15 million per month. But the ‘angelic saviours’ led by Dr Bashir Isyaku paid themselves alone, without including other staff members, the sum of N23.3 million at one sitting. 

A breakdown of the largesse showed that Dr Isyaku took N5.2 million as his salary for the month of June, while four other members of the interim management took home the sum of N3.4 million each. They are Kene Nwanegbo, Garba Sani, Babangida Bashir and Mrs Omobolanle Olatunde. The remaining two members were paid N2.4 million each, and these are Mrs Maryam Onusaba Gomina and Arc. Ramalan Ahmed Umar. This scenario was replayed in July when the team again paid itself the same N23.3 million as salary. 

In view of the above, it is my belief that whoever says public servants who displayed this level of greed and corruption should go scot-free, because they refunded what they ‘stole’ has to think again. These are people who deserve to be taken to EFCC also. Merely instructing them to go down to collecting N500,000 and asking them to pay back what they took without any scruples, will not prevent them from doing what they did at AICL again, given another chance. 

From all indications, they are worse or at least no better than the team they replaced. Therefore the Bashir Isyaku-led team has to be sacked by the FCT minister and has to be reported to the ICPC or the EFCC to explain by what moral authority they decided to rob AICL blind.  

Should the FCT minister decide that he is happy with them paying back N46.6 million and continuing with their work at Abuja Investment, I would like to remind him that keeping them their amounts to what the Hausa adage ‘Ba a rabu da Bukar ba an haifi Habu’ means. This translates to ‘They are yet to rid themselves of Bukar and they gave birth to Habu.’ 

You see Bukar and Habu are both variants of the name Abubakar. The proverb means that one is yet to rid himself of a problem but he somehow decides to embrace an identical one. In other words, the FCT minister sacked the former management in order to rid the place of corruption but ended up appointing people who are more corrupt than the first team. 

The thing to do is to sack Bashir Isyaku and members of his team with despatch, and to hand Abuja Investment to another interim management. Hopefully, the new team will be full of honest and upright people.