Will the JAMB report suffer the same fate as all reports on our national conferences have suffered, under past administrations?
The Joint Administra-tions and Matricula-tion Board (JAMB) story has been coming in bits and pieces (snake swallowed cash; car burnt with documents inside etc). So here is a background on the ongoing JAMB Scam saga: between 2010 and 2016 when Prof. Dibu Ojerinde was JAMB Registrar, a little under N51m (N50,752,544 precisely) was remitted JAMB to the Federal Government.
On August 1st 2016, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede was appointed Registrar of JAMB. In 2017 alone 5 billion naira was remitted by Board to government coffers. The disparity was staggering. How did Oloyede get that to happen? Immediately he was appointed, Prof. Oloyede stopped the sale of JAMB scratch cards which were being used by JAMB staff to perpetrate fraud. The Prof replaced the scratch cards with the use of (self-generated) PIN numbers to enhance transparency.
Then President Muhammadu Buhari took it all a notch higher. Shocked by the highly disproportionate difference in remittances, the President ordered a probe of 4 former JAMB Registrars. A team of auditors was dispatched, who also took inventory of scratch cards.
It is from their report that the tale of the money-eating snake emerged.
Some other cases of fraud discovered in some JAMB state offices include:
– Yobe – N613,000 missing. They claim it was Boko Haram that wiped out all documentation.
– Osun – N1.34m missing. The State Coordinator said the money “just disappeared”.
– Kogi – N7m missing. State Coordinator, Daniel Agbor said it was lost to poverty. The ‘kind’ man gave loans of government money to himself and other ‘hard up’ staff, which were never repaid.
– Gombe – N10.3m missing. Murtala Abdul there claimed that other officials forged his signature and stole the money. But the auditors discovered he signed the documents himself and made away with all the money.
– Plateau – N15m missing. Zakada Yakubu was in charge.
– Edo – N31m missing. Priscilla Ogunsola the coordinator cannot account for it.
– Nasarawa – N23m. Coordinator Labaran Tanko said the cards were lost in his burnt car. It was discovered that all the cards had been used by JAMB candidates.
– Makurdi – N36m missing. Philomena Chieshe claimed the raw cash was swallowed by a live snake!
Now, leaving the realm of the ridiculous to that of the next step, JAMB spokesman Fabian Benjamin says disciplinary measures are ‘going to be taken’ against the suspended staff. Well, that was 2 Sundays ago; what else has been done?
The JAMB audit committee has written a report and submitted it to the Federal Ministry of Education ‘where action will be taken’.
This is the tricky part. Questions, questions; WHEN will action be taken by the Ministry? Or will the report suffer the same fate as all reports on our national conferences have, in the past administrations?
Is it proper to simply suspend patently fraudulent workers and then write reports on them? SHOULDN’T THEY BE HANDED OVER TO THE POLICE?
Is the aim of the probe simply to fulfill the President’s request for it, or to get to the bottom of the fraud, and possibly make recoveries? In that case, wouldn’t timely action be a necessity? Tomorrow Monday starts the third week in this saga.
I am truly worried, and it is not out of place to recall that aphorism “There are few better measures of the concern a society has for its individual members and its own well-being than the way it handles criminals (Ramsey Clark).
Well, Senator Shedu Sanni had moved into action-mode on the subject; he took some snake charmers, and some cartons of anti-venom to the JAMB headquarters to see if they could smoke out the money-eating HUMAN SNAKE, without getting bitten in the process! Nice.
But I have one suggestion. Let JAMB NOT GO TO THE EFCC. That would be big mistake by JAMB, the EFCC has had a string of failures in prosecuting fraud/financial crime cases. A string so long it stretches on indefinitely; in short they have LOST EVERY CASE OF fraud, stealing or corruption against all politicians and government agencies that they have handled, even in this anti-corruption clime. Just 5 days ago, they lost a N5bn corruption case against ex-Governor Chimaraoke Nnamani of Enugu State. A Federal High Court sitting in Lagos STRUCK OUT THE CASE for – lack of evidence!
JAMB would be well advised to proceed to the Criminal Investigation Division CID of the Nigeria Police (no more Force).
And the legal department of JAMB should be ready and armed with all evidence for our tenuous court proceedings, believing that the pain of the process is the sacrifice for justice to be done and be seen to be done – if only for the sake of the young JAMB candidates they cater to, to give them an abiding life guideline (crime doesn’t pay).
The Boko Harasser
The officers and men who have lost their lives fighting the Boko Haram insurgency are the ones we often celebrate, but here is one hero of Boko Haram who willingly gave up his life to save the lives of many in this terrorist struggle.
Exactly one year and one month to the day, today, an SS 1 student of Daussalam Science and Islamic Academy, DAISA got blown up by another very young person: a female suicide bomber in Borno State.
Yakubu Muhammed Fanname is the young lad who confronted the young suicide bomber as she was trying to forcefully enter a mosque in Kaleri in Borno. Brave Yakubu noticed her movement and rushed over to prevent her from gaining entry. In the ensuing struggle the female suicide bomber detonated the bomb on her and blew up both herself and Yakubu. Yakubu, the one I choose to call The Boko Harasser died instantly; he sacrificed his life to save several others from death.
Three things here –
(1) The lad was so young a teenager in SS 1
(2) He was a member of the vigilante group the Civilian Joint Task Force – he VOLUNTEERED to help with security, unlike the soldiers who are paid to do their jobs and are compensated if they pay the supreme sacrifice.
(3) He KNEW what it meant to tackle a suicide bomber. Yet he willingly gave up his life. He knew by so doing, he would save several other unsuspecting people there from certain death.
With tears, I declare young Yakubu a Hero.
BILLY GRAHAM (WILLIAM FRANKLYN GRAHAM JNR.) RIP
The man referred to as the most important evangelist since Apostle Paul died 4 days ago, aged 99. Evangelist Billy Graham, loved by Christians and people of all faiths alike, passed away in his home in North Caroline USA. He was always at the top of the polls of ‘most admired’ people.
Billy Graham started his missionary work in 1944, in a career where he reached millions of people worldwide. He also became the spiritual counselor to several American Presidents. With all this, it is still said of him that ‘he preached Christ, not himself, not politics, not prosperity and also carried unimpeachable personal integrity.
When asked what he would like people to say about him when he died, Graham said, “I want to hear one person say something nice about me and that’s the Lord; when I face him, I want him to say ‘well done, thou good and faithful servant”. For Billy Graham, I say” IT IS DONE!
