Head of the Committee for the Protection of Peoples Mandate, CPPM, Nelson Ekujumi, has expressed joy that former Spokesperson of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Olisa Metuh, has agreed to refund N400m he allegedly received from the office of the former National Security Adviser, NSA, during the last administration as well as support Buhari in the fight against corruption.
Ekujumi further praised the president for “his resoluteness, courage, determination, focus and commitment to winning the war against corruption.
“One is also happy that despite the campaign of blackmail, calumny and mudslinging against the anti-corruption war as being one sided, persecution, witch-hunt, vendetta and stifling of opposition from expected quarters of beneficiaries and associates of corruptly indicted persons, the government has remained focused with the results manifesting on a regular basis.”
He recalled that Olisa Metuh had admitted to collecting the N400 million of the diverted funds originally meant to fight insurgency from the office of Sambo Dasuki on the instruction of former President, Goodluck Jonathan for a job which cannot be verified.
He noted that Metuh decided to change “after acting a failed part of his moribund film in which he vowed not to refund a kobo of the people’s money which he collected illegally, went on hunger strike and when his system failed to sustain the hunger because it was alien to it, attempted to eat his confessional paper which he must have mistook for food, attempted intimidating the judiciary by alleging bias after the prosecution had closed its case and when it was his turn to open his defence and then his falling health all with the purpose of stalling his trial.
“This is not to forget that while the whole drama of Olisa Metuh entertaining the Nigerian people and attempting to ridicule and intimidate the security agencies and judiciary lasted, seeing that there was no escape route or tactics that could truncate his trial for corruption, the family quickly waded in and promised to refund the money to save their son which was commendable, but too late in the day.
“But the questions that we asked the family then and which they were and have been unable to provide answers are: where were they when Olisa Metuh was ridiculing the whole country by his theatrics? Didn’t they know that they should have called him to order earlier than now by wading in?
“Well that is a lesson or food for thought for families to learn to bring up their children in the proper and moral ways, lest the family name be subjected to public damage like the Metuhs are now undergoing of which history is already documenting for posterity?”
He said turning a new leaf should not prevent Metuh from being prosecuted.
“We must commend the officers and men of the anti-graft agency who have been consistent, professional and dogged in the exercise of their responsibility to the Nigerian people by winning a soul, a new convert into the camp of the war against corruption.
He added, “As Mr Metuh has voluntarily offered to refund what he vowed that he will only refund over his dead body sometime ago, may we call on the anti-corruption agencies to, apart from collecting the money, ensure that Metuh is prosecuted in line with the constitution for subjecting us all to this psychological trauma of his embarrassing drama, waste of tax payers’ money for prosecution and to serve as a deterrent to others that it is wrong and criminal to receive public money that is diverted for phony contracts.”
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