AtikuGate: Withdraw From Race, Apologise For ‘Fleecing’ Nigeria, APC Tells Atiku

The ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, presidential campaign council has called on Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to step down from the race and apologise to Nigerians over allegations of graft.

This call was made on Monday during a press conference addressed by Dele Alake, Special Adviser, Media, Communications and Public Affairs, Festus Keyamo, Director, Public Affairs and Chief Spokesperson of the campaign council, Bayo Onanuga.

The APC said “for about a week now, Nigerians have been in deep shock over the grave revelations by a whistle-blower, Michael Achimugu, who has provided the nation with iron-cast evidence of letters of appointment by Alhaji Atiku Abubakar emails, documents, audio clips, sworn affidavit and direct oral evidence as to how Atiku Abubakar during his tenure as Vice-President” had “colluded with his then boss, President Olusegun Obasanjo, to fleece the country and steal public funds using what he termed ‘Special Purpose Vehicles’ (SPVs).”

The party alleged that those SPVs were companies Atiku admittedly registered upon assumption of office as Vice-President (with the approval of President Olusegun Obasanjo) using “trusted allies” as shareholders and Directors.

According to the party, “The purpose was to divert government contracts to these companies as “consultants” and then paid monies into these companies and used those monies to fund the PDP and their private businesses and family activities.

“We can all vividly recall that during that tenure, both President Olusegun Obasanjo and Atiku Abubakar built the Bells University and American University respectively.

“Now, we know from where the funds came.”

POSSIBLE INFRACTIONS OF THE LAW

Justifying its call, the party listed what it called infractions that have ruled Atiku out of contention in the presidential race.

It said Atiku committed offences against the code of conduct for public officers as contained in “Sections 5, 10, 13 & 17 of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act” which states as follows that “A public officer shall not put himself in a position where his personal interest conflicts with his duties and responsibilities.”

The party further referenced section 1 of the Act which provides that “apublic officer shall not ask for or accept property or benefits of any kind for himself or any other person on account of anything done or omitted to be done by him in the discharge of his duties.”

According to the APC, Atiku also committed offence bordering on money laundering.

In its justification, the party said Section 18 (2) of The Money Laundering (Prevention And Prohibition Act), 2022 provides that “Any person or body corporate, in or outside Nigeria, who directly or indirectly— (a) conceals or disguises the origin of, (b) converts or transfers, (c) removes from the jurisdiction, or (d) acquires, uses, retains or takes possession or control of any fund or property, intentionally, knowingly or reasonably ought to have known that such fund or property is, or forms part of the proceeds of an unlawful act, commits an offence of money laundering under this Act.”

It further accused Atiku of offence of criminal breach of trust pointing out that Section 311 of the Penal Code Law which states that “Whoever, being in any manner entrusted with property or with any dominion over property, dishonestly misappropriated or converts to his own use that property or dishonestly uses or disposes of that property in violation of any direction of law prescribing the mode in which such trust is to be discharged or of any legal contract express or implied, which he has made touching the discharge of such trust, or wilfully suffers any other person so to do, commits criminal breach of trust.”

According to the APC, the “facts so far presented to the world clearly indicate that Atiku Abubakar has a case to answer. In other climes when such serious allegations arose in the middle of campaigns, the law-enforcement agencies acted decisively.”

The party noted that the “issue of the Marine Float Account is not new to Nigerians. In the voice note, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar can be heard boasting that the issue of that account was thoroughly investigated by EFCC, yet then he was smart enough to escape

“However, we note that in 2006, at the height of his public quarrel with Obasanjo over the sharing of money, the same PDP officially asked Atiku Abubakar to refund N500 Billion taken from that account.

“In the circumstance, since the nation now knows that the Marine Float Account and other similar accounts were ‘SPV’ accounts, it follows that all payments made into that account were monies stolen from the public coffers.

“Therefore, we call on all security agencies to recover all monies withdrawn from that account by anyone for that matter.”

Consequently, the party called “on Atiku Abubakar to immediately tender an unreserved apology to the Nigerian people and step down from the Presidential race forthwith, whilst handing himself over to the law enforcement agencies. What is now clear to the Nigerian people is that between 1999 and 2007:

” President Obasanjo and Atiku ran a criminal enterprise and an empire of fraud in Abuja at the same time Asiwaju Bola Tinubu was toiling very hard, dutifully and meticulously laying the foundation to rebuild Lagos State.”

The party stressed that the accusations have exposed Atiku, claiming that he has nothing to campaign on as a former Vice President.

According to the ruling party, the whistle-blower, Michael Achimugu, must be protected as “no harm must befall him or members of his family.”

The party said it “suspect that some goons of Atiku Abubakar are planning to eliminate him and harm members of his family. We shall hold Atiku Abubakar responsible if anything befalls this patriotic Nigerian or members of his family.

“We also encourage him to reveal to Nigerians those “earth-shaking” revelations he is withholding for the sake of this nation and the future of our children.”

The party promised that “in the next few days to initiate a judicial process seeking the outright disqualification of Atiku Abubakar from the race based on these facts. He is clearly ethically challenged, morally damaged for the highest office of the land.”