Last week's judgment of the Federal High Court, Abuja freeing four directors of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) and an expatriate contractor, charged with embezzling N787million of the commission's fund, is very depressing. In discharging and acquitting the accused persons, Justice Adamu Bello, ruled in favour of 'a no case' submission made by the defence, after the prosecution had closed its case. The trial judge held that the accused persons were mere scapegoats, insisting that it was members of the board at the time of the award of contract in 2005 that should have been charged for the offences.
The prosecuting agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, (EFCC) is reported to have disagreed with the judgment and has decided to appeal. The discharged directors of UBEC are, Molkat Mutfwang, Michael Aule, Andrew Ekpunobi and Professor Bridget Sokam; while the Amercian contractor is Alexander Cozma. The two companies allegedly used to siphon the money are Intermarkets USA LLC and Intermarkets Nigeria. According to the judge, the real culprits are free, while the above charged persons have no case to answer. He held that the accused persons were being victimised.
The case brought by the EFCC against the accused persons was that they were complicit in an illegal diversion of the contract sum for the supply of learning facilities to all secondary schools in Nigeria. Now, with the judgment, unless upturned on appeal, nobody would be held accountable for stealing such a humongous public fund, meant for the upgrading of our schools. We say without equivocation that such a development is totally unacceptable, and we urge the office of the Attorney General to ensure that those who stole our common patrimony are made to answer for their criminality.
The public, no doubt, is left confounded, at the sad turn of events. Both the prosecuting EFCC commission and the judgment acknowledge that N669 million, representing 85 percent of the contract sum, was unlawfully paid up-front by UBEC, without the approval of the Federal Executive Council, as required by law. It was also established that further sums of N41 million and N16 million, not within the contract sum, were paid to the contractor. Yet, as it is now, those docked did not do the heist. Who did?
It will therefore be in the interest of the public to know whether the claim of the judge that the wrong parties were brought to court is true. While we have our doubts, as to how UBEC bid committee can be exculpated from a fraudulent award of contract under their nose, it is the duty of the prosecution to bring the correct parties to court. If it turns out that the wrong parties were charged to court, as held by the trial judge, then the EFCC will need to convince Nigerians that such a serious error was inadvertent.
While the office of the Attorney General of the Federation is sorting out who is wrong between the judge and the commission, it may be helpful to quickly arraign the members of the Board of UBEC in 2005 that awarded the unlawful contracts as held by the judge. It will be unfair for such a huge sum to be lost between the tardiness of the prosecution as implied by the judge, or because a judge misdirected himself, or is swayed by untoward reasons. The sharp difference between the position of the EFCC and the judge needs to be explained.
All concerned must remember that the future of our country is at stake. This is one sleaze that must be cracked and those guilty punished.
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