[dropcap]S[/dropcap]o, it is true that Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai, Nigerian chief of army staff owns two magnificent properties in one of the world’s top tourist and business destination, Dubai.
In a statement released by the Nigerian Army, Buratai admits to acquiring the said properties while serving as a Brigadier General in the Nigerian Army. He also claimed that he used his savings to buy the two Dubai properties.
What shocks me is not that he has these corruptly acquired properties, it is that Buratai has the effrontery to admit to having them, but goes on to lie about how he acquired them. Also the ever-ready corruption-lynching online mob in Nigeria is quiet about this corruption scandal.
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From available records, the monthly take home of a brigadier general in the Nigerian Army is N700,000.00 a month. How did this husband of two wives and several children manage to save on this salary to the extent of acquiring two choice properties in Dubai?
On the other side of the political spectrum is a woman by name Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke. She is a university graduate with a major in architecture, and a Master’s degree from one of the world’s top universities, Cambridge University. She is worked in Shell Nigeria Limited, an oil giant from 1992 and rose to the rank of executive director in 2006 before Late President Musa Yar’Adua appointed her a minister in 2007. She has been a minister from that time till 2015. Five of those years in which she served Nigeria as a minister, Alison-Madueke was petroleum minister. By virtue of her position, she was also chairman of the state own oil company, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC.
Recently the henchmen of General Muhammadu Buhari’s draconian government, Ibrahim Magu showcased some beads on TV and some ‘ankara’ fabric and said they found them in the Abuja house Diezani Alison-Madueke. They claimed that the beads jewelry (about 8 of them) sets were valued at $2 million. They showed an Abuja house and said it belonged to Alison-Madueke. Then the lawless EFCC boss said that the jewelry and house were obtained from “stolen government funds”.
Meaning, in essence, that a woman of Diezani Alison-Madueke’s status cannot afford to buy sets of bead jewelry (which are sold for about N30,000 a set) unless she stole government money to acquire it. And a woman like her can only own a duplex in Abuja, unless she stole government money to buy it.
So, there you have it Nigerians, the double-standard and brazen ethnicity and gender bias in Buhari’s anti-corruption fight.
A common soldier, known for achieving nothing extraordinary, like General Buratai is permitted to own two properties in choice areas of Dubai while an extra-ordinary achiever like the first female executive director of Shell in Nigeria, the first woman to head the petroleum ministry can’t own N30,000 jewelry unless she steals.
The truth is that Nigeria, as an entity has run full cycle. Something has got to give because the lopsided hydra-headed monster ravaging the land in the name of Buhari’s anti-corruption fight will tear this country to splinters.
The indigenous people of southern Nigeria will not be able to endure this molestation from Buhari and his minions much longer.
Euphemia Udanoh is an author, scriptwriter, and youth activist. She can be reached by email. Connect with her on Facebook.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
