SIR: Wanted and hunted for financial crimes for years now, Abdulrasheed Maina, former chairman, Pension Reform Task Team, stunningly and colonially walked back into the same office where he was accused of squandering what he was charged to unveil and guard.
Probably thinking we had forgotten what page we opened last with him, he went straight to recover what was then taken away from him, following a barrage of criticisms trailing his handling of Police pension funds.
But we were out to shock Maina. We had not forgotten an inch or a pin from his last duty as chairman of an investigating panel, charged with the onerous task of uncovering the mess in the police pension scheme.
And from there, we started off – shouting down and hauling stones at whoever brought back a man on the wanted radar of the EFCC as well as the police over misuse of trust and betrayal of confidence reposed in him a few years back by the entire nation.
And then, the shocker: everybody denied ever appending to Maina’s return. They traded his recall and threw blames at one another. While the Head of Service of the Federation washed her hands off any Maina return, the minister under whose purview Maina was reinstated dusted his feet too, thereby, raising the poser, ‘who then reinstated Maina’, a man wanted and curiously trailed by the nation’s security for a disservice?
Maina was recalled by someone, and an integral part of the present system. He was returned by his accomplices and cohorts in the crime he is wanted for. And uncovering the unseen hands in his return is a leeway in unearthing the cabal holding our system by the jugular.
So, we refuse to be cowed this time. Maina’s collaborators are not ghosts; but human beings and Nigerians, working in high places. And it is incumbent on the APC-led federal government to carry out the task of unveiling them or treat it with levity as usual.
After all, this is Nigeria – a place where everything goes. This is an enclave where laws are made for the less privileged while the high and mighty are well, above board. So I won’t be surprised if in the next couple of weeks, the Maina conundrum is swept under the carpet like many others of its ilk.
Just a few months ago, after Evans capture, surfaced a drama with the caption, “Evans vanishes” in most of our major dailies, and I hummed deep in my heart – “Nigeria we hail thee!” But they hurriedly told us he was in their custody but in a different location.
So what does not happen here? The other day, currencies of different foreign backgrounds was trailed to a former NNPC boss’ residence and recovered by the federal government, and that was the last we heard about it.
Then again, a house stashed with foreign currencies was discovered in Lagos, and everybody denied ownership of such property because we are in a country where everybody belongs to nobody.
So I won’t be astounded if Maina reinstated himself or was rather brought back to service by a group of ghosts, working for their selfish interests. But be it as it may, the manner in which this singular Maina melodrama is handled will either make or mar the Muhammadu Buhari administration in its war against corruption.
- Gwiyi Solomon,
Enugu.
