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“People should be conscious that they can change a corrupt system.” —Peter Eigen, founder, Transparency International
By Cosmas Omegoh
Recent echoes from the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation formerly known as Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development are still leaving Nigerians of good conscience gutted.
Dr Betta Edu, the minister of the humanitarian ministry, at the centre of the corruption saga was suspended on Monday by President Bola Tinubu.
Dr Edu is being suspected of heist for seeking to wire a whopping N585 million of government money into an individual’s account.
A leaked internal memo dated December 20, 2023, issued by Dr Edu suggested she directed the Accountant General of the Federation, Oluwatoyin Madein, to transfer the said money to a private account belonging to a certain Bridget Oniyelu Mojisola said to be a civil servant.
Dr Edu was seeking to transfer the money from the National Social Investment Office’s account to serve as grant for vulnerable groups in Akwa Ibom, Cross Rivers, Lagos and Ogun states.
Mojisola believed to be the project accountant of Grant for Vulnerable Groups was to do so.
Madein claimed that her office refused to oblige Dr Edu’s request because the procedure for such transfer was faulty.
Those in position to know said Dr Edu’s conduct was in breach of the Nigerian Financial regulations, which prohibit payment of such large volume of money from the government into an individual’s account.
Dr Edu allegedly did not deny the memo she wrote to the Accountant General of the Federation. At some point, she was said to have come out accusing some desperate individuals earlier implicated in the N44.8 billion scam sweeping through the ministry of trying to “stain her integrity” for alerting the government of the dirty deals that went on in the National Social Investment Programme Agency (NSIPA) under the watch of Halima Shehu. It would be recalled that Halima Shehu was sacked some days ago for her activities in overseeing the Conditional Cash Transfer Programme during the former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.
The humanitarian ministry under Dr Edu’s watch was said to have handed out contracts worth over N3 billion to some contractors for the verification of 11 million homes across the country. The said spurious contract was purported to have been executed within a month. A total of 12 firms, some of them believed to be non-existent, took part in the exercise.
The current Minister of Interior, Mr Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, admitted that his wife’s company, New Planet Project Ltd, got a part of the pie.
His wife received a princely sum of N438 million to execute a part of that National Social Register contract.
When what happened in the humanitarian ministry became public knowledge last week, an obviously embarrassed President Tinubu suspended the minister, directing her to hand over to the permanent secretary in her ministry. Then he asked the EFCC to commence investigations into what went down.
But looking at the humanitarian ministry, it could be seen that it has a long history of allegations of malfeasance.
It would be recalled that the immediate past minister of the ministry, Sadiya Umar- Farouq, is currently under the EFCC’s radar over allegations of corruption. Under her watch, the ministry allegedly laundered a gargantuan N37.1billon social investment funds, a part of the reason Halima Shehu was sacked.
Since 2020, the ministry which was set up by Buhari in 2015 to help alleviate the pains of suffering Nigerians, its managers have been brazenly stealing from the people it was created to faithfully serve. Corruption has dogged every step it took. The way and manner it handled the controversial school feeding programme continues to leave a sour taste in the mouth.
For instance, the ministry claimed that it spent N13.5 billion monthly on the homegrown school feeding programme during the COVID-19 lockdown era, an allegation Umar-Farouq continuously denied.
Controversy still exists as to how long the same school feeding programme lasted, and the time claimed by the ministry, after allegations that the ministry stopped the programme six months before Umar-Farouq left office. There are also doubts about the quality of meals served the beneficiaries to warrant the large sums of money the ministry claimed to have spent monthly.
In addition, the ministry had claimed it spent N1.01 billion in December 2020 in 15 states on its Grant for the Rural Women programme. However, reports alleged that some 15 individuals alone received N1billion each at a time, as part of the sum earmarked for the project.
Now, the latest vibes from the humanitarian ministry is musical to no ears. That has left everyone pondering over the relevance of the ministry whose job before its creation was carried out by the Presidency.
And to recall that everything dirty about the ministry since its inception has been carried out by the female folk leaves nothing to be desired.
It is against this foregoing that more layers of doubt have been created over the relevance of the ministry which Buhari created to provide succour to vulnerable Nigerians and victims of disaster and other circumstances. No, it has turned itself into the people’s albatross – a conduit pipe for funneling off the public commonwealth – this time with renewed impunity.
It is on this note that strident calls ringing out for the scrapping of this ill-fated arm of government can neither be misplaced, nor overlooked.
And what is more, to think about the deep involvement of Tinubu’s super ministers in the latest saga, just less than seven months of their assumption of office, leaves Mr. President’s highly vaulted “Renewed Hope” agenda with little traction.
Already, what is going on now is offering distraught Nigerians the binoculars to look at other Ministries, Departments and Agencies amid allegations of massive corruption in the government circles.
Many Nigerians across the divide are beginning to wonder the mindset of people now being appointed into government offices.
Have morals, ethics and common sense been jettisoned and animal behaviour of some sort enthroned in the public square, they ask.
Furthermore, where does the Dr Edu, Umar-Farouq and Halima Shehu example leave the nation and its people going forward?
To some Nigerians, their faith and confidence in the government’s ability to fight corruption has been shaken to their foundation.
That also leaves many wondering if that monster called corruption will ever be tamed as every government that has left office appears to have done better than its successor.
Dr Edu, who is right now on the spotlight, is a medical doctor, sired by a disciplined missionary.
She was thrown to national limelight by the former Governor Ben Ayade’s administration in Cross River State.
During the Tinubu electioneering, she was up in the air as the APC National Women Leader, going everywhere the party’s campaigns took her to. Any wonder why some people still see her appointment as minister as compensation for work done.
In 2019, she was made Commissioner for Health, a position she held until 2022, and was credited to have acquainted herself so well on the job, and also having worked as chairman of the Cross River State COVID-19 Response Taskforce.
Since her role in the talk-of-the-town scandal, she has been engaging in pushback, aside denying wrongdoing. But everyone is waiting to see how her story will end eventually.
