Mambilla Reopens Ige’s Murder, Third Term Agenda as Obasanjo Testifies in France …Soyinka may address Arbitration Panel, as Agunloye says Obasanjo lied in his statemen
The Mambilla power project, estimated at $6 billion, was expected to generate 3,050 Megawatts of electricity as the single biggest source of power in Nigeria where over 200 million people currently share less than 5 Megawatts of electricity. As anyone would expect, the conspiracies surrounding the project, its many court trials in Nigeria and the Arbitration in France will throw up several issues; and this is beginning to happen.
For instance, about three months ago, the National Assembly of Nigeria set itself a task to find the way out of the stalemate and may inadvertently expose the multiple contracts, crimes, and criminalisation surrounding this critical hydroelectric power project which has been held up for about 40 years. Also, one of the former Ministers of Power under the Buhari regime, Alhaji Mamman Sale was recently arrested for transferring N33.8 billion from the Mambilla project account of the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) to 13 different Bureau De Change operators in exchange for the foreign currencies they gave to him.
The Attorney General of the Federation and EFCC, acting for FGN, are attempting to criminalise another former Minister of Power, Dr. Olu Agunloye, not for misappropriation or stealing of billions of Naira but for awarding a Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) contract in 2003 “without cash backing” and for “receiving a sum of N5m (five million Naira) in three instalments in 2019”, over 16 years later. This ploy is expected to serve as an adjunct to the Statement of Defence of the FGN at the Arbitration to evade the consequences of breaches and mishandling of the Mambilla project between 2004 and 2022.
As part of the conspiracies, former President Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, who is also a major player in the power sector, recently submitted a Statement to the Arbitration Panel which reopened the murder of a former Minister of Power under his tenure. The Statement re-echoed salient points which led the former President Yar’Adua, the Nigerian House of Representatives and private investigators like Col. Dangiwa Umar to conduct probes into the Power Sector under Chief Obasanjo for the period 1999 to 2007. The Statement also reopened the reasons which led the revered Colonel Umar to link the activities of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo in the power sector to the murder of Chief Bola Ige and to the infamous Third Term Agenda. Col. Umar was certainly not the only one who connected the actions of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo in the power sector with his sordid Third Term Agenda to perpetuate himself as President of Nigeria.
It will be recalled that Chief Bola Ige, the former Minister of Power under Chief Obasanjo was brutally murdered before his family in Ibadan in December 2001. In October 2024, when Chief Obasanjo was explaining himself at the Arbitration about his former Minister of Power, “Chief Ige who was murdered,” he referred to Dr. Agunloye, another of his former Minister of Power as “a protégé of Bola Ige”. Also, when Chief Obasanjo was challenged in September 2003 of complicity in Chief Bola Ige’s murder, he also referred to Dr. Agunloye as “protégé of Wole Soyinka”. So, when is Chief Obasanjo going to open up about his own involvement in the gruesome murder of Chief Bola Ige?
At the Arbitration, Chief Obasanjo reported that, “even though Ministerial contract limit was N25 million, the former minister Agunloye awarded a N780 billion contract in May 2003” and that he (Obasanjo) “did not find out about the ‘2003 award letter’ until twenty years after”. However, Agunloye promptly responded that, “The former President has lied to the International Arbitration Panel; his Minister of Power (between August 2003 and May 2007) deliberated on the ‘2003 award letter’ in September 2003 and several times after. The legal luminary, Chief Afe Babalola, SAN (known to be Chief Obasanjo’s friend and lawyer) wrote the FGN under Chief Obasanjo on the ‘2003 award letter’ in 2005; and in the Years 2005 and 2006, President Obasanjo made presidential minutes on the letters of the Chinese Partners of Sunrise Power Company which referred to the ‘2003 award letter’.”
Chief Obasanjo also told the Arbitration Panel that: “On 20 May 2003, a day before the FEC meeting, I held a meeting with Dr. Agunloye to identify the priorities of the power sector, Dr. Agunloye was well aware that the Mambilla Project was a key focal area for me because I had discussed these key elements and the Mambilla Project with Dr. Agunloye.” But, in a swift reaction, Agunloye has said “these are all blatant lies. President Obasanjo did not hold any such meeting with me.”
Dr Agunloye also strongly disputed what the former President Obasanjo told the Arbitration Panel that: “Dr. Agunloye understood my view that a law needed to be in place for the deregulation of the power sector with this regulatory framework necessary prior to any contract for the Mambilla Project being signed or executed”. Agunloye vehemently retorted: “Chief Obasanjo did not tell me in 2003 ‘that a law needed to be in place for the deregulation of the power sector with this regulatory framework necessary prior to any Mambilla contract’”.
The former Minister, Agunloye also stoutly contested the “Conclusions of the FEC meeting” which Chief Obasanjo submitted to the Arbitration, saying, “the former President has concealed to the International Arbitration the fact that only proper Minutes of the 21 May 2003 FEC meeting and the adoption of the Minutes at the next meeting can be presented as authentic ‘FEC Conclusions’”. Dr. Agunloye concluded that Chief Obasanjo did not have the authentic FEC Conclusion of the 21/5/03 meeting, and said, “Chief Obasanjo concocted one.”
Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka said he was ready to appear before the Arbitration Panel for reasons including that the 2003 BOT contract was being presented by FGN as a procurement contract of N780 billion. The Professor is also miffed by the claims of FGN that “the findings of EFCC have shed a new light on Dr. Agunloye’s behaviour making it now clear that the 2003 BOT contract award was prompted by corruption,” which the Professor said was pre-empting the court judgement in an ongoing trial in Nigeria.
The Laureate is said to find it demeaning for his country to plead at an International Arbitration that “although it could only establish three payments to Agunloye in 2019, totalling N5m for the 2003 contract of N780 billion, there must be other payments that have not been uncovered and that his children have bought expensive houses in the US,” citing the house of only one child, Mr. Jide Agunloye, a Nigerian-American since 1998, with the photograph of his house in Connecticut, USA and alluding to it as “proceeds of corruption”. This was in reference to Mr. Jide Agunloye’s house which he acquired through a 30-year mortgage in 2007, and he is still paying mortgage till today.
Alh. Keshinro Gbadamosi.
KeshG-G Consult. Abuja. 28 November 2024
