Why Is Atiku Still Walking Free?

By JESUTEGA ONOKPASA

I once went to Dino Melaye’s house and when I drove into the premises, ended up having to park my car in front of the gate post since there was simply no other space left to park because the entire compound was choked up with cars!

When I stepped into the main house, I was surprised to discover that Dino had actually managed to park one more car right inside his living room!

Indeed, I met him apparently negotiating yet another car purchase with some Arab guy who could barely speak intelligible English.

This fellow tried to be all friendly with me, apparently hoping I was some car freak like Dino whom he could probably sell some refurbished scrap to at a premium.

I studiously ignored him.

Later, Dino’s cook brought him what I considered a huge quantity of rather unappetising-looking beans on a gigantic plate, some of which he proceeded to offer me.

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Because I don’t digest beans very well, I politely declined.

Before I left, Dino handed me an autographed copy of a book he’d authored about corruption in Nigeria, which I never bothered to read, and, the title of which I do not even care to remember.

Dino has always tried to position himself as a catcher of thieves but is now the pathetically unqualified and pitiably ineffective spokesman of People’s Democratic Party, PDP, presidential candidate, Atiku Abubarkar, a man presently the focus of a most embarrassing corruption scandal with remarkably clearcut particulars.

Atiku’s accuser, Michael Achimugu, is a former aide and publicity consultant to the former custom’s officer who operated taxis, ran logistics companies and connived with smugglers to clear containers from our ports without paying duty, while being a public servant!

He has not only called out Atiku but methodically authenticated and solidly backed up his explosive revelations with a devastating avalanche of corroborating evidence!

Melaye, in his usually flippant and disgracefully juvenile manner, had initially sought to write off Achimugu by insinuating that the young man was never Atiku’s aide.

In response, Achimugu promptly produced multiple engagement letters and similar correspondences!

Dino, the would be thief-catcher, whose house nevertheless looks like a depository of stolen goods, has since gone curiously silent.

Daniel Bwala, another of Atiku’s mouthpieces, having tried to avoid responding to the scandal and failed, then nevertheless refused to address the issue but, instead, offered some balderdash to the effect that Achimugu’s revelations are capable of endangering the prospects of young people with their elders!

According to Bwala, “young people may be considered as blackmailers and I hope that message does not resonate with the elite or the elderly so that they come to have distrust for the younger ones”.

You can’t make this stuff up!

What Bwala was basically saying to others of his own generation is “if, as a young person, you see an in elite or elder stealing, doing something similarly wrong or otherwise destroying the country, don’t say anything or such elites or elders will stop carrying other young people along and teaching them how to steal, do wrong things and destroy their country” (just as Atiku has apparently been teaching Bwala since they started working together, I would assume)!

All Progressives Congress, APC, Presidential Candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, has been accused of all manner of infractions without even the slightest shred of evidence to back those patently false allegations.

Nuhu Ribadu, Tinubu’s erstwhile tormentor during the Obasanjo years, has told us how the Asiwaju is the most investigated Nigerian yet nothing was found against him.

The Americans, legendary haters and hunters of drug dealers, who arrested the head of state of another country and transported him to their own country to face trial for drug running, have repeatedly given Tinubu a clean bill of health but his traducers continue to persist in their infernal fiction.

Peter Obi, Nigeria’s number one importer, chief facilitator of dependence on imports and fanatical sustainer of consumption in our country, who nevertheless claims he wants to move our economy from consumption to production, once invested government funds in a private company that makes beer with the Biafran flag as its logo!

His driver was also caught with N250 million in the hood of Obi’s car.

He continued to serve as the director of a private company while Governor of Anambra, a state he was barely able to rule with any degree of effective authority.

Yet some miserably misguided people have decomposed into a personality cult around this utterly ridiculous character!

Being a candidate for office does not confer immunity on anyone nor does it render them outlaws beyond the reach of the law.

The quantum of information necessary to taking action against any person has already been surpassed with respect to Achimugu’s revelations against Atiku Abubarkar.

Atiku is not above the law and it is a total disgrace that the usually noisy anti-graft agencies have not taken him into custody or brought him in for questioning.

Indeed, it is a national embarrassment that the Cameroonian national and indigene of Dubai is still walking free, claiming he wants to rule our country.

Onokpasa, a lawyer and member, All Progressives Congress, APC Presidential Campaign Council, writes from Warri.