…Momoh, HURIWA disagree
Ndubuisi Orji;Paulinus Aidoghie, Abuja
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday insisted that it has no case to answer regarding the list of alleged looters released by the Federal Government.
Federal Government, had in two tranchees, named alleged looters of the federation account, particularly during the administration of former president Goodluck Jonathan.
But the PDP said those on the list, some of who are not even its members, were individuals who have neither been indicted nor convicted for corruption by any court.
The opposition party in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, said the Presidency and the All Progressives Congress (APC) had wanted to use the looters’ list as a ploy to divert public discourse on their failures in the administration of the country.
The PDP said some of the issues the government wanted to divert attention from included the “vote of no confidence on the Buhari administration by eminent statesmen, including former President Obasanjo, former military President Ibrahim Babangida and former minister of defence and ex-chief of army staff, Gen. TY Danjuma, who also indicted the administration of failure to protect the citizens.
But a lawyer and former Minister of Information and Culture, Prince Tony Momoh, said the disclosure of names of alleged treasury looters by the Federal Government was done to meet the yearnings of Nigerians who have been asking for it.
Momoh said: “Don’t forget that Nigerians have been asking him to release the list. People have been saying release, release, release, release. If they said release and they now take a decision to release, obviously, people will say you are not even releasing enough. So, it is a question of political decision to release,” Momoh said.
However, believing that the recent releases of the lists violated constitutional tenets of fair hearing, due process of the law and impugns the constitutional integrity of the Court system in Nigeria in accordance with section 6 of the Nigerian constitution, the Human Rights Writers Association Of Nigeria (HURIWA) has resolved to petition the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) to begin the process of disbarring the duo of Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the information minister and Alhaji Abubakar Malami, the federal Attorney General from practising as lawyers in Nigeria.
Rising from its emergency executive committee’s meeting in Owerri, Imo State, HURIWA, in a media statement by its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National Director of Media, Miss Zainab Yusuf stated that the action of listing persons whose cases were in courts as if they were already convicted did not just violate section 36 (5) which is the constitutional plank of fair hearing but has rubbished the credibility and integrity of the judicial arm of government and graphically depicted Nigeria to the rest of the civilized world as a “banana Republic.”
According to HURIWA: “We are of the firm beliefs that the duo of Lai Mohammed and Malami who have decidedly rubbished the legal profession and lampooned the constitution should be barred from ever practicing unless and except the Nigerian Bar Association has become an all comers’ affair whereby professional rascality is tolerated.”