I felt the need to write this article because of
what happened in London last week when ex-President
Olusegun Obasanjo came visiting to brief the world
press on his peace mission in Central Africa.
Although I did not attend, I read and learnt that
the briefing was marred by protesters, mostly
Nigerians, who do not feel Obasanjo is morally right
to be accorded such honour as overseeing and
bringing about peace to another African country with
regards to his own dismal performance as President
of Nigeria for eight tortuous, but eventful years.
Eggs and rotten tomatoes were allegedly thrown at
him and I think he finally got the message that he
is not the most popular of Nigerian leaders. I had
written some time ago that Obasanjo was always fond
of not taking responsibility for anything (An Abject
Abdication of Responsibility –
www.nigeriavillagesquare.com 23.07.2008) I have
been proven right almost a year later.
During a subsequent interview with the BBC, he must
have been exasperated by the questions thrown
mercilessly at him to explain himself on allegations
of his government being very corrupt, that he burst
out “I’m
Ready For Trial - (Nigerian Tribune, 20.03.2009).
I thus would like to comment on some of the issues
thrown up by him, and I have therefore broken them
down as he was reported to have answered some
questions and tried to draw my own opinions from the
ex-President’s answers.
“FORMER President Olusegun Obasanjo on Thursday
vehemently declared that he was not corrupt and that
he was ready to face trial if found culpable of
corruption”.
My views and opinions on this outburst by our former
president is that we should take him up on his offer
to subject himself to a probe. He has thrown down
the gauntlet to the authorities. And in fairness to
him and to Nigerians, let Obasanjo prove to the
world that he himself, personally, was not corrupt.
It is the least he could do or say under the
circumstances.
Was it just righteous indignation or was he being
sincere? History and posterity surely will be the
best judge of him. At the risk of sounding
sanctimonious and being accused of being in support
of Obasanjo, I have always been of the conviction
that on the balance of probability, Obasanjo might
not have been personally corrupt in the sense that
he was dipping his hands in the treasury, however,
there are three issues that made him culpable and
which as a leader, he cannot absolve himself of:
One is that as the elected and recognised head of
the nation, it was his absolute and moral
responsibility to ensure that his government was not
corrupt; that the people he had around him either as
Ministers, Aides, legislature, and judiciary and
even the state and local government executives were
not corrupt. The buck should always stop at his
desk. He has to be help responsible for anything
that goes wrong. A leader is always held responsible
for the actions of his followers. Right now, we are
seeing the fall-out from his eight-year
administration (many ex-governors from his party are
known to have looted their states’ treasuries; power
probes, scandals upon scandals, etc) that has even
led a leader as knowingly corrupt as Babangida to be
labelling Obasanjo’s administration as worse than
his own in terms of corruption. Even the Abacha clan
are saying the same thing.
Secondly, the fact that Obasanjo imposed Umar Yar
‘Adua on the country cannot be denied. This in
itself is political corruption. Obasanjo supervised
the most unfair elections in the history of Nigeria,
both in 2003 and 2007. It is on record and we are
also seeing the fallout, with governors, new and
existing forced out of office now and again. This is
a blot on any good intentions he might have. Also
linked with this political corruption was Obasanjo’s
attempt to get a Third Term in office, against the
rules of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria. He heated up the polity so much with this
ill-thought, ill-advised idea, that it was a wonder
the country did not break up.
Third, he had eight long years to turn this country
around, despite the fact that previous military
regimes had virtually ruined the country. When he
was elected, he swore before God and Man to do his
best for Nigeria and Nigerians; eight years later,
Nigerians discovered they had been had, nothing
changed for them, yet Obasanjo’s acolytes and
followers had become billionaires. Obasanjo failed
to take action against the corrupt excesses of his
favourites (or maybe his errand boys and girls) like
Peter Odili (Obasanjo almost allowed him to become
the President of this country), James Ibori (the
consummate thief is now a power behind the ruling
party and the Presidency itself), Andy Uba, Lamidi
Adedibu, Tony Anenih, Bode George, and many other
party officials and executives. He allowed Chief
Adedibu to virtually bring Ibadan and Oyo State to
their knees. These are all political corruption of
the highest order. And OBJ was responsible and
culpable.
Culpability
descends from the Latin concept of fault (culpa),
which is still found today in the phrase mea
culpa (literally, "my own fault"). In
explanations and predictions of human action and
inaction, culpability is a measure of the degree to
which an agent, such as a person, can be held
morally or legally responsible. Culpability is
defined as
deserving of blame or censure as being wrong, evil,
improper, or injurious.
From a legal perspective, culpability
describes the degree of one's blameworthiness
in the commission of a crime or offense. Except for
strict liability crimes, the type and severity of
punishment often follow the degree of culpability.
Legal definitions (Wikipedia) of culpability are:
-
A person acts intentionally with respect to
a material element of an offence when:
-
if the element involves the nature of his
conduct or a result thereof, it is his conscious
object to engage in conduct of that nature or to
cause such a result; and
-
if the element involves the attendant
circumstances, he is aware of the existence of
such circumstances or he believes or hopes that
they exist.
-
A person acts knowingly with respect to a
material element of an offense when:
-
if the element involves the nature of his
conduct or the attendant circumstances, he is
aware that his conduct is of that nature or that
such circumstances exist; and
-
if the element involves a result of his conduct,
he is aware that it is practically certain that
his conduct will cause such a result.
-
A person acts recklessly with respect to a
material element of an offense when he consciously
disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk
that the material element exists or will result
from his conduct. The risk must be of such a
nature and degree that, considering the nature and
intent of the actor's conduct and the
circumstances known to him, its disregard involves
a gross deviation from the standard of conduct
that a reasonable person would observe in the
actor's situation.
-
A person acts negligently with respect to a
material element of an offense when he should be
aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk that
the material element exists or will result from
his conduct. The risk must be of such a nature and
degree that the actor's failure to perceive it,
considering the nature and intent of his conduct
and the circumstances known to him, involves a
gross deviation from the standard of care that a
reasonable person would observe in the actor's
situation.
In short:
-
A person causes a result purposely/intentionally
if the result is his/her goal in doing the action
that causes it,
-
A person causes a result knowingly if he/she knows
that the result is virtually certain to occur from
the action he/she undertakes,
-
A person causes a result recklessly if he/she is
aware of and disregards a substantial and
unjustifiable risk of the result occurring from
the action, and
-
A person causes a result negligently if there is a
substantial and unjustifiable risk he/she is
unaware of but very much should be aware of.
The first two types of culpability are each a subset
of the following. Thus if someone acts purposely,
they also act knowingly. If someone acts knowingly,
they also act recklessly.
With these legal definitions, Obasanjo cannot
possibly absolve himself of any corrupt practices
committed during his tenure, by his Government, by
his Ministers, by his party chiefs and supporters,
by his Governors, whether they belong to his party
or not, because he knew, or should know, all that
was going on within his country. He was the
Commander-In-Chief after all, and he must be held
responsible for their actions.
“Chief Obasanjo, who was answering questions on the
British Broadcasting Corporation interview programme
Hard Talk, said he is the only former president in
Nigeria
that has ever been investigated by the two
anti-corruption agencies in
Nigeria”.
Here I will agree with the Balogun of Otta. Why
should Obasanjo be the only former President of
Nigeria being investigated? What about Babangida?
What about Abdulsalaam? Even what about the
shameless Earnest Shonekan? And if we are going to
investigate past presidents, why not all former
Governors, both military and civilians? I
acknowledge that investigating all these will pose
logistical and resource problems e.g. lost and stale
evidence, manpower, etc, but if we are going to
crucify Obasanjo, then we must also crucify former
heads of state like Babangida and Abdulsalaam.
Unfortunately, Abacha was disposed of, but at least
we knew what he did.
This is my take on this issue. Obasanjo must not be
singled out for investigation, prosecution or
whatever. Babangida and Abdulsalaam must be brought
to justice too. Maybe even as far back as Jack Gowon,
Shehu Shagari and Buhari. At least to prove which of
them was not corrupt.
We all know impractical these exercises will be and
the futility of it, so let us forget it and let God
and history be these people’s judge.
Describing BBC Stephen Sackur’s allegation that he
was a corrupt leader as an insult, said “when you
allege you must have facts.” He stated that it was
under his government that three ministers and a
senate leader were arrested and prosecuted for
corruption: “What else do you want?” Obasanjo
queries.
I disagree with Obasanjo on this issue. In eight
years of flagrant corruption, which he must not say
he was not aware, to bring only three ministers, a
senate leader, one police chief, two or three
governors arrested and prosecuted can hardly be
counted as phenomenal success, can it? Three
ministers and a senate leader in eight years, when
up to 36 governors, 40-something ministers and
hundreds of top civil servants and Board
chairpersons, government agencies like Customs, NNPC,
PHCN, NDDC were actively salting away billions of
our money, not to talk of hundreds of local
government Chairpersons and others? And even after
prosecution, these thieves got away with very light
sentences which were no more than slaps on the
wrist. No, OBJ, we want more! “What else do we
want”, you asked? Indeed, Sir, that simply was not
enough, and even then, those that you mentioned were
only the tips of the iceberg. How much did they
steal and were recovered compared to what their ilk
walking around free today stole?
OBJ, Nigerians want justice, prosecutions, prison
sentences, and even probably the death penalty for
some of these thieves, who have made the lives of
their fellow countrymen a living hell on earth.
Nigerians want examples made of them to deter others
permanently so that they know government money is
not meant for government house. To make them know
that they MUST be working for us, and not stealing
from our collective, God-given wealth, and
condemning us to poverty, disease, hunger,
helplessness and death.
On his daughter, Iyabo, who is being investigated
for alleged corrupt practices, Chief Obasanjo said
she’s not been convicted. Asked if he will take
responsibility for Iyabo, Obasanjo said, “I beg your
pardon, she is a 42-year-old woman and can take
responsibility for herself. You are insulting me,
can you say that to a European leader?
Yes, Obasanjo could not legally be held responsible
for his wayward daughter’s crimes. Like he rightly
said, that woman is a 42-year old woman, who is
supposed to be in her husband’s house (if she is)
and not be dictated to by her father. However,
Obasanjo can always advise her. And this is where
his paternal and moral irresponsibility comes in.
Today, at almost 53, I am still taking advice from
my Mum, and if my father was alive, I would still be
deferring to him and taking his advice. Obasanjo
could have done the same. Iyabo took very great
advantage of being the president’s daughter for
eight ignoble years. If her father had not been the
president, I doubt if anybody would have heard of
her. After all, where was she all these years before
she became a Senator? And instead of being humble as
a First Daughter, she was throwing her weight about,
getting involved in unwholesome corrupt practices
and generally giving herself and family a bad name
and press. Is that a responsible or good daughter?
However, I cannot pronounce judgement on her,
because each family to its own.
The problem remains that Iyabo has not been
convicted despite admitting to many corrupt
practices. When will that ever happen? She is still
in the Senate, attending parties all over the place,
and even being considered for the gubernatorial race
in Ogun State come 2011. (See my article “Iyabo
Obasanjo is Not Guilty; We Are”
www.nigeriansinamerica.com 06.01.2008 and
www.nigeriavillagesquare.com 29.05.2008)
And Sir, you are very wrong on the issue of this
kind of question being addressed to a European
leader. The freedom of the press and general Human
Rights that exist in
Europe
these days is such that journalists and even
individuals can ask their leaders almost anything.
That is freedom and transparency for you. The leader
now has the prerogative to answer or not, truthfully
or not, but we, the people, have a right to ask the
leaders what they are doing for us, about us and
against us. Asking you if you are responsible for
your wayward daughter is quite in order. All you
have to do is say No or Yes, or not answer at all.
This is the way I see Obasanjo’s outburst and feeble
defence. He still needs to convince us that he was
not corrupt – and believe me – that will be very
difficult, but not impossible, for him to do.
It really is very simple. For his own sake, I
sincerely hope Obasanjo can, otherwise his name will
be vilified for centuries to come as the man whom
God gave several chances to deliver his people, but
failed to take the rare opportunities that God gave
him. That is a sin.
Akintokunbo Adejumo lives and works in London, UK. A
graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979)
and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985), he also
writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet
media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today
Online, Nigerians In America, Nigeria Village
Square, Champions Newspaper, ChatAfrik.com, African
News Switzerland, New Nigerian Politics, Gamji.com,
Codewit.com, etc.
He is
also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, (www.championsfornigeria.org)
an organisation devoted to
celebrating genuine progress, excellence,
commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to
Nigeria and Nigerians.
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