Stepping into a contentious election-year issue, a Nigerian Senate panel said on Wednesday that President Olusegun Obasanjo and his deputy-turned-political-foe both illegally used funds from the country’s massive oil industry.
The seven-member committee’s report recommended that a body set up to investigate elected officials look into the alleged crimes by Obasanjo and Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, who has been disqualified from April presidential elections on related corruption charges.
Both officials are currently immune from prosecution. The full Senate must approve the findings for them to have effect, but no debate is scheduled till after April 21 presidential elections meant to secure civilian rule in coup-prone Nigeria.
However, the panel’s findings that both men handled funds illegally by releasing money outside the authorised system of requisitions come as Abubakar fights an electoral commission disqualification related to his role in disbursing revenues from Africa’s biggest oil industry.
Abubakar fell out with his boss last year after Obasanjo’s supporters tried to amend Nigeria’s Constitution to allow the president another elected term. Later, an administrative panel arranged by Obasanjo said Abubakar was corrupt, findings that are at the root of his troubles with the Obasanjo-appointed electoral commission.
Abubakar has said he acted properly in all cases and his camp hailed Wednesday’s findings, which represented the first time Obasanjo had officially been accused of impropriety by a panel in the Senate, dominated by his ruling party.
His campaign issued a statement praising the panel for ”standing up for the truth, irrespective of whose ox is gored”.
Obasanjo and most of his top confidantes were travelling overseas and no comment was immediately available on the Senate findings.
Lawyers say only the nation’s highest court can overturn the electoral commission’s decision, which cleared 24 other candidates last week, including the other two likely leaders: ruling-party candidate Umaru Yar’Adua, a governor of northern Katsina state, and General Muhammadu Buhari, a former military leader.
If held successfully, the April polls would set up the first civilian-to-civilian transfer of power in Nigeria’s history since independence from Britain in 1960. Previous electoral transitions have been interrupted by annulments or military coups.
With 140-million people, Nigeria is Africa’s most-populous nation and its largest oil producer. Many in West Africa fear massive chaos in Nigeria could send refugees streaming across the region, undermining years of hard-won peace and increased stability in the region.
Obasanjo’s 1999 election alongside Abubakar ended years of brutal military rule. Obasanjo, a one-time military leader who handed over power to a civilian government in the 1970s, won re-election in 2003 polls that the opposition called rigged. — Sapa-AP