Taciturn Buhari and corrupt Nigerians (2)

In my considered opinion, it is better to pry the loot out of the sticky fingers of the compromisers of our common patrimony than merely sending them to jail which has been the case since the time of General Murtala Muhammed of blessed memory. Muhammed ousted the government of General Yakubu Gowon in 1975 on account of corruption and probed top functionaries including governors and permanent secretaries with the resultant forfeiture of assets acquired with proceeds from corruption. Disappointingly, assets such as choice real estates, cinema houses and the like seized from those found guilty have since been returned to the looters with Nigeria and indeed Nigerians being the ultimate losers.

Given that the option of amnesty or its variant has been successfully applied by former President Umar Yar’Adua who introduced the policy as solution to the protracted Niger Delta militancy, it seems like a wise concept that President Buhari should direct his mind to.

The deal struck by former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s government with the family of Sani Abacha on stolen money hidden in banks abroad is a typical model of how not to chase a bull into a china shop, with its attendant collateral damage. Although the recovered money from the Abachas via the unconventional initiative was not channelled into specific social services, as government should have done for the maximum benefit of the Nigerian people who are usually the worst victims of corruption, nevertheless a substantial sum has been repatriated even as it is being alleged that most of the funds have been re-looted by public officials in charge of handling it, if the buck-passing between the EFCC, National Security Adviser’s office and Office of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice is anything to go by.

Preferring to recover money rather than clamping treasury looters in jail may be novel in Nigeria but it is not uncommon in advanced democratic societies because in the United States of America, plea bargain has become a culture in the justice system and in civil cases, affluent people also pay huge sums of money to authorities in lieu of prison terms. Nothing testifies more to the efficacy of that method than the recent sanction of major European and American investment and retail banks found to have ‘gamed’ the banking system and were fined billions of dollars by the US Department of Justice for the benefit of the American society.

In light of the foregoing, l reckon that the ultimate interest and objective of President Buhari and his government would be how to find the funds to fulfil his lofty campaign promises such as feeding students at least once a day and N5000 allowances to be paid to the teaming army of unemployed Nigerians. Obviously, such recovered funds could come in handy for channelling into such productive sectors like education of our children who are the future leaders of our country and providing stipends for the jobless in the society who may become easy prey for recruitment for disruptive activities of terrorists in the north-east and militancy in the Niger-Delta, if their cost of living is not augmented.

For the avoidance of doubt, the kernel of my avowal is that the society is better off when looted funds are recovered and such monies are applied for the benefit and socioeconomic advancement of the long-suffering Nigerian people as opposed to merely clamping officials found guilty of corruption in jail at the further expense of the taxpayer through cost incurred during litigation and prison management expenses.

Of course, there may be some Nigerians who subscribe to the existential concept of ‘the rich also cry’ and would therefore like to see guilty oil subsidy ‘fat cats’ and other people who engaged in other forms of financial perfidy rot in jail, but to what benefit is that revenge attitude to the intended lifting up of Nigeria’s economy from the doldrums which is the raison d’etre of the emergence of the present government?

Before I conclude, it is apropos that I apprise President Buhari and his team the wise counsel of Martin Luther King Jnr, the great liberator of the black race in the USA, on critical thinking: “Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions.” That assertion rings true till date. So Mr. President must strive to rise above the mediocrity that King alluded to in his admonition.

At this critical juncture in the life of Nigeria, thinking out of the box for a more productive solution, which some form of amnesty for those found guilty of financial infractions portends as opposed to long jail terms which has been the case in the past, should be explored. As I pointed out in my last widely published article ‘BUHARI: May Your Road Be Rough’, it is clear that the choices open to our president to make in order to steer Nigerian society and economy out of the ominous path to bankruptcy are hard but Mr. President should not hesitate to take the required actions, no matter how initially painful they may be. In the manner that a loving mother would administer unpalatable anti-malaria medication to an ailing infant to save the child who may in naivety be resisting the caring mother’s perceived ‘wickedness’ in administering the bitter drugs mercilessly and forcefully, President Buhari could literarily pull Nigeria back from the brinks if he elects to think critically out of the box and act decisively.

Magnus Onyibe