Our attention has been drawn to the shameless lies a former Inspector
General of Police, Mr. Mike Okiro recklessly spewed to the media
yesterday. The cause of Mr. Okiro's anger, the statement, in a London
court, by Mallam Nuhu Ribadu that James Ibori was instrumental to his
emergence as the Inspector General of Police (IGP) needs no further
equivocation as it was an open secret to everybody in the government
circle then. If Okiro is now denying this in public, there is no way he
can deny this open secret to a number of people including an influential
governor from the North-Central then, and a couple of other people who
helped facilitate his selection by Ibori. It was this same shameless
method of desperate lobbying that Okiro, a chronic political jobber and
sycophant of the first order would use in getting subsequent
appointments as Chief Security Officer to the PDP national chairman and
later, regrettably, as the chairman of the Police Service Commission.
The assertion by Okiro that Ribadu wanted to be the IGP further
underlines the former IGP as a perennial peddler of falsehood. The truth
is Nuhu Ribadu's focus then was consolidating on his modest efforts at
the EFCC, especially at a time when he was working on high-profile
cases, including that of Okiro's godfather, James Ibori. We therefore
challenge Okiro to name those people he called Ribadu's friends that
narrated the fictitious story of Ribadu's interest in becoming the IGP
to him.
The highest distortion in Okiro's statement, however, is his attempt
to rewrite the well-known and widely documented assassination attempts
on the former EFCC chairman, and Okiro's hand in it all. It is
ridiculous that Okiro is now desperately trying to paint himself in
another colour after all the schemings he orchestrated. It beats our
imagination that Okiro would want a Nuhu Ribadu he was fighting to
destroy to report those incidences to him. It would have been a case of
having a culprit to be a judge in his own case. At the time, the trio of
Micheal Aondoakaa, the former Attorney General of the Federation, Okiro
and Mrs Farida Waziri, the former EFCc chairman, had created a hell out
of the world for Ribadu. The only sensible thing to do was to avoid
these characters and seek solace somewhere else. This notwithstanding,
it is a blatant lie that Okiro telephoned Ribadu "several times" but
that he did not answer his calls. What Ribadu and other Nigerians easily
recall was an elated Okiro rushing to address the press to deny
something he knew nothing about. The bullet-riddled car Ribadu drove
during that unfortunate life threatening incident is still there, if
Okiro or any other person would want further proof.
On the issue of withdrawal of Ribadu's personal security, if Okiro is
suffering from selective amnesia, let him be reminded that that was
exactly what he did. He also redeployed Ibrahim Lamorde out of EFCC, to
Bauchi State Police Command as Area Commander in Ningi. He did the same
thing to other top EFCC operatives that Nigeria spent a fortune to train
as investigators. One of them suspected to be close to Ribadu was even
locked up for months in police custody. This also belie his statement
that as IGP he could not have altered the postings of police within the
EFCC.
As for Okiro's corruption credentials, we would like to alert the
retired IGP that he is dancing naked in the gallery as his nasty record
is something known to a lot of people. A man who clearly reeks of
corruption, is Okiro denying that he is corrupt when we all know he
cannot account for the source of the wealth he used in building a
shopping mall in Jabi, a hotel with casino in Lugbe and a private
school, all in Abuja? This is not to mention his property in Lagos and
Port Harcourt, while he was still serving in the police. If a public
servant, one tasked with the responsibility of protecting the lives of
Nigerians and instilling discipline in the police, managed to amass such
wealth, what gut does he have to talk of corruption? It is a national
tragedy that a man of such flawed character has now been appointed to
head an important institution like the Police Service Commission. May
God rescue Nigeria
Abdulaziz Abdulaziz
Media Assistant to Mallam Nuhu Ribadu
Waziri is a liar; I trained her- Ribadu
No comments:
Post a Comment