Date Published: 03/20/10

Treasury Looting: Dr. Hong as a Major Accomplice by Maliki Salaudeen

Farida Waziri

Personally, I am not carried away by the recent removal from office of members of the Federal Executive Council of Nigeria. Simply put, it’s a long over due thing. Without sounding sentimental, it is a common knowledge that over 90% of the immediate past ministers were square pegs in round holes in their various fields of assignment. Their removal is therefore a welcome development. What beats the imagination of some concerned Nigerians especially about the immediate past Minister of State Health, Dr. Aliyu Idi Hong is his recent disposition as someone who cannot live without scandalous deals. He has also allowed himself to be over whelmed by personal and unfounded sentiments and vendetta.

The former Minister’s actions and comments has no doubt exposed his despondency and desperation as he is oblivious of the circumstances which informed his assumption of office in 2007.

For one, in a petition letter dated 21/1/2008 and addressed to the EFCC Chairman by some concerned staff of the National Commission for Museums and Monument, Dr. Aliyu Idi, Hong, the then minister of State in the Ministry of Tourism and Culture was fingered in the theft of over N104 million from the Personnel Costs Account of the Parastatal.

This scenario emanated from a deal he and his partners in crime perfected in the Federal Ministry of Culture and Tourism when Dr. Hong and Mr. Adetokumbo Kayode were there as ministers in 2007. From January to April of that year, due to a shortfall of N307 million in approved budgets on Personnel Costs, staff of the Commission was paid 75% of their salaries. According to details from a petition letter which I obtain, the remaining 25% shortfall from staff salaries within the period under review was diverted to personal use by both Dr. Hong and his former Boss on one hand and officials of the parastatal on the other.

Similarly, there was also a shortfall of N37million on arrears of monetization for three months i.e October to December, 2005. In their dubious wisdom to correct the aforementioned shortfall, the budget office of the organization approved the sum of N344 million. This was through an application to the Budget Office of the Federation. Fortunately, the money was released from the Service Wide vote in two installments of N172 million each in November and December, 2007.

While the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission is yet to let the former minister off the hook of its search light of the source of the money used to buy a N300 million mansion located at plot 331 Utako District in the FCT, iReports-.ngs, investigations have revealed that Dr. Hong has been fighting yet another battle with some staff of the National Commission for Museums and Monuments. Reports pieced together from another petition from the organization, indicate that a Toyota Corolla officially attached to Dr. Hong as a minister in 2007 which he was supposed to have returned on his redeployment to another ministry has evaporated into thin air. The vehicle, with Engine No. 2933678 and Chassis No. jtdbr 22e703217112 had already been taken to his hometown for political campaigns ahead of his 2012 governorship ambition. This is aside from his being accused of withholding a Honda Accord car which equally belongs to the organization.

Further revelations on the N104 million stolen and shared among the former ministers and their fellow partners in crime at the Museum and Monuments Commission, showed that the money was paid in the name of one Mr. E.C. Metuaghan, the organization’ s Ag. Director of Admin and Supplies on four different payment vouchers namely:

It may interest you to know that, while the first voucher with Ref. No. NCMM/HQ/PO/752/2007 was meant to pay promotion arrears for staffers of the organization for 2006 and 2007, actually there was no staff promoted in those two years as claimed by the Treasury Looters. Also, the other two vouchers as stated above in columns B and C, were equally raised for the same settlement of promotion areas which never took place, while voucher No. NCMM/HQ/PC/2007 was meant for Workshop/Training which never took place either. In line with the present administrations policy, since none of those promotions and trainings took place before 31/12/2007 as claimed by Dr. Hong who supervised the parastatal in that period, the total sum of N104, 334,250.00 deducted from public treasury would have been returned to government coffers and NOT shared among themselves.

For some of us familiar with the unbecoming dimension of the goings on at the Commission in particular and the Tourism and Culture ministry under Dr. Hong’s leadership then, he needs to be reminded that his administration can be likened to the imposition of Armageddon on the staff. Under the guise of reforms, Dr. Hong became a task master in the mould of his mentor and godfather Jibril Aminu. Instead of bread, he has been giving the staff of Tourism and Culture stones.

But if he feels otherwise and claim his records are that clean as he would want the whole world to believe, let Dr. Hong in all honesty answer the following few questions. Didn’t he bribe some officials of the EFCC and ICPC alongside others when they were summoned on this corruption case in 2008? From which source did he acquire the sum of N.3 billion with which he bought the mansion situated at plot 331 Utako District in the FCT? Also, the source of his money with which he is currently building a private hospital worth over N300 million in Kano State? Did he really refuse to return two motor vehicles belonging to the NCMM barely two years after he was redeployed to the Ministry of Health?

I doubt if the former minister would have enough courage to react to those posers. For it is an open secret that Dr. Hong has no respect for the sanctity of truth. Accountability and Transparency means nothing to him. But with the recent hurricane Goodluck Jonathan which ruffled the feathers of the high and mighty in the land recently, the young man has begun to read the handwriting on the wall that, the ground under his over bloated ego has finally caved him. Let me remind him that worse bureaucratic gladiators have passed through the same terrain in the past. When they acted or spoke, it was to trample on and to offend the sensibilities of fellow Nigerians. Infact, they boasted that no power under the universe can render them irrelevant, but when denouement came like a whirlwind, they were all swept away into the dustbin of history. So also history has finally hanged my brother Dr. Aliyu Idi Hong simply for ignoring its lessons.

Maliki Salaudeen is of the Network for Good Governance based in Yola, Adamawa State