By Baron Ike
Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State has called former Vice President Atiku Abubakar a liar over claims Atiku made recently alleging that he was betrayed by the governor and former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Nuhu Ribadu.
An online newspaper, PREMIUM TIMES, had published excerpts of an interview where Atiku made the claims.
But El-Rufai would not take any of that and fired a statement he personally signed Tuesday, November 15, accusing Atiku of falsehood, saying “has a record of spewing outright lies and innuendo against my person”.
“As we struggle to build a law-abiding society and secure progressive outcomes for our people, we cannot allow the triumph on these shores of those who will have us move to a post-factual world,” El-Rufai said. He noted that “Atiku’s expertise in the dark arts of damaging other people through a campaign of lies from him and his media machine” is capable of returning the country to its past.
El-Rufai said contrary Atiku’s claim, he never had anything to do with the incorporation of Transcorp.
His words:“Those that established that company and fronted it like Festus Odimegwu, Tony Elumelu, Otunba Lawal Solarin and Ndi Okereke-Onyiuke are still around and alive.
“As such I could not have and did not offer Alhaji Atiku any shares in Transcorp. I declined the shares that were offered to me. Having done that, how could I have offered anyone shares?”
El-Rufai said he even advised the then President Olusegun Obasanjo, Atiku, and then finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, not to accept the shares they were offered by the promoters of Transcorp.
El-Rufai added: “My counsel to them was based on the grounds that they would face conflicts of interest when Transcorp bids for privatization assets.
“At the time Alhaji Atiku and Ngozi were chair and vice-chair of the National Council on Privatization, and were particularly directly involved in approving the sales of state-owned enterprises and assets.
“It is too late in the day to try to pretend that the fiasco concerning the attempt by then Senators Ibrahim Mantu and Jonathan Zwingina to extort money from me for Senate clearance never happened.
“All Alhaji Atiku has just done is confirm that he paid the Senators, as I revealed in Page 139 of my book.” El-Rufai wrote The Accidental Public Servant in 2013.
He argued that Atiku unleashed his media team in a campaign of vilification on him when the book came out.
Again he wrote:“Despite the viciousness of the attacks, they did not contest or explain away his shenanigans that were detailed in the book, from the Ericsson manoeuvre, to the Abuja water treatment plant contract and his obsession with marabouts and their assurances of the political big prize.
“He might also consider a full reckoning for what he and his acolytes did with public funds in the PTDF imbroglio, rather than indulging the usual bold face of the Nigerian big-man.
“As a federal public servant, my oath of allegiance appropriately stood with the Federal Republic of Nigeria, not the big men whose conduct I was privileged to witness at close quarters.
“People like Alhaji Atiku think that loyalty to them should be the goal of a public officer, and that it should trump the oath of allegiance to the country.”
Does the spat have anything to do with their political interest? El-Rufai spoke in the affirmative.
Hear him: “Alhaji Atiku is already running for 2019, and he thinks that he can make people like us collateral damage in his attempt to rejuvenate his image.
“This obsession for power inclined him to support the rebellion against the party that manifested in the National Assembly, and is continuing with obvious disrespect for the incumbent president.
“Everyone knows that I support and will continue to work for the success of President Muhammadu Buhari as he leads our country through tough times.”
Atiku has not told anybody he wants to seek political office in 2019. But it is public knowledge that El-Rufai is interested in running for presidency should President Muhammadu Buhari decide not to take another shot at the office.
El-Rufai tried to renew old tales about Atiku, accusing the former vice president of corruption and that Atiku cannot go to the United States for fear of being arrested.
“Can Alhaji Atiku explain the findings in the report of the United States Senate Permanent Sub-Committee on Investigations which detailed a pattern of wire transfers of more than USD 40 million from offshore companies like Siemens into bank accounts controlled by him and one of his wives?
“The report detailing the US Senate findings is online, as one of four case histories of foreign corruption in the USA. Alhaji Atiku should tell a better tale of why he is avoiding the United States of America.
“Someone as obsessed with Nigeria’s presidency as he is, should clear up such matters conclusively. We wait to see how well he does with that,” El-Rufai said.
But in fielding questions to Premiun Times on why he thinks El-Rufai was insulting him in his book Atiku said: “Did he give any evidence or prove where I was corrupt? Again this is the same el-Rufai whom I was instrumental in bringing into government and making him Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises, BPE, and eventually a minister. You also forgot that it was the same el-Rufai and Nuhu that my boss used in cooking up the indictment that was eventually thrown out.
“So, where is the evidence of corruption? It’s just not fair for you to say somebody is corrupt without substantiation. This is the same el-Rufai who testified on TV that he worked with me as DG of BPE for four years and there was never a time I asked him or instructed him to do anything unethical in those years.
“So, how am I a corrupt person? This is the same el-Rufai and others who incorporated Transcorp during my time as Vice President and offered me shares and I declined. I wrote them officially to say it was unethical of me to have accepted those offers. So, where is the corruption toga coming from?”