UJI ABDULLAHI ILIYASU examines the allegation levelled against Minister of Education Adamu Adamu by former Executive Secretary of TETFund, Dr Abdullahi Bichi Baffa, which has been swept under the carpet, and calls on anti-graft agencies to probe the allegation.
Background
In January, staff of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) was shocked to see their former boss, Professor Suleiman Elias Bogoro returned to office without notice.
His admirers said his appointment has to do with his track-records during his aborted first tenure as the Executive Secretary of TETFund.
The supervising ministry of education carelessly gave insubordination as the reason for Dr Baffa’s removal from office.
Baffa was accused of involving himself in politics in his home state of Kano and therefore unable to discharge his functions without distractions.
Bichi was a Special Assistant to Minister of Education Adamu Adamu before he was appointed as TETFund boss in 2016. He played prominent role in President Buhari’s election in 2015.
TETFund was established originally as Education Trust Fund (ETF) by the Act No. 7 of 1993 as amended by Act No 40 of 1998 (now repealed and replaced with Tertiary Education Trust Fund Act 2011) as an intervention agency to provide supplementary support to all levels of public tertiary institutions.
The main source of income for the agency is the two per cent education tax paid from the assessable profit of companies registered in Nigeria.
The Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS) collects the tax on behalf of the Fund.
The alleged 10 per cent kickback
The sacked Executive Secretary of TETFund, Dr. Abdullahi Bichi Baffa, has accused Minister of Education Adamu Adamu of demanding from him the sum of N200 million as bribe from TETfund. His refusal to submit to the demand led to his unceremonious sack from office. Dr Baffa’s appointment was terminated by the federal government without reasonable reason.
Consequent upon that the federal government reinstated Professor Suleiman Elias Bogoro who had been relieved of the job by the same administration in 2016 for his alleged connection with the former President Goodluck Jonathan’s 2015 campaign funds.
During an interview with BBC Hausa Service in Kano after his sack, Baffa alleged that the minister had sent a contractor demanding 10 per cent of N20bn from the N200bn meant for disbursement to tertiary institutions across the federation.
“The minister has demanded kickbacks from me. He sent a contractor for that purpose and even had the strength to dictate the amount of money. By his estimation, he said even if I deducted 10 per cent from each institution, I would have collected at least N20 billion.
“I want to assure you that I have never collected a single naira from any institution as he thought, and if he or anybody has evidence to prove against me, I will be willing to accept the death penalty,” Baffa said.
Baffa said Adamu Adamu had earlier accused him of inaccessibility, insubordination and talking to the press without his authorisation. Calling such allegations trivial, Baffa said he had spent more time at the Federal Ministry of Education as Technical Assistant than he did at TETFUND, and wondered why the minister suddenly turned against him while he was heading TETFund, but not when he was serving him.
No comment from minister
In a telephone call to Deputy Director in charge of Press at Ministry of Education, Ben Bem Goong, he only said, “No comment.” Since then nothing has been heard about the weighty allegation against the minister of education in a government which corruption fight is one of its cardinal objectives.
EFCC’s silence
Where are the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC)? Or is Adamu Adamu enjoying some immunity as a minister of the Federal Republic? Or he belongs to the class of sacred cows in the current dispensation?
Baffa told BBC Hausa that Adamu Adamu had sent his closest contractor to him to accuse him of three things.
“He mentioned the first, the second; and the third one he said I distributed over N200 billion to tertiary institutions.
“(He said) even if I used to collect at least 10% as kickback, I am supposed to have gotten at least N20 billion for myself.”
But Baffa expressly said that he never got any kickbacks from any institution that TETFund distributed money to.
Why won’t the EFCC, ICPC or the National Assembly investigate this matter but just allow it to go under the carpet?
Baffa, to prove his innocence, even requested death penalty, so what are the anti-graft agencies waiting for?
“I want to say here now that I have never asked any institution to give anything as kickback and if there is, let that school come forward.
“If they bring any evidence indicting me, I’m ready to accept death punishment,” Baffa said.
PDP’s amusement
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) said Baffa’s confession had further exposed “the seething corruption in the Buhari presidency.”
In a statement by its national publicity secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, the party noted that the revelation did not come to many Nigerians as a surprise, as it had vindicated its position that “the Buhari presidency is inherently corrupt and thrives on concealments, deception, beguilement, propaganda and lies.”
Bogoro cleared of wrongdoing?
The federal government has said it reinstated Professor Bogoro as the Executive Secretary of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETfund) after it found out he was wrongly accused of misappropriating N200bn at the agency.
Baffa, who was former aide to Minister of Education, was named the head of TETFund on August 2, 2016, alongside 14 other heads of parastatals under the Federal Ministry of Education after Bogoro’s sack.
The Minister of Education, Mr Adamu, in a statement said Bogoro’s reinstatement was with immediate effect, “with the same terms and conditions as it were in his previous appointment and as stipulated in the TETFund staff conditions of service”.
Mr Bogoro was alleged to have misappropriated N200bn released for special intervention projects to beneficiary institutions, which he had allegedly ploughed into the failed re-election bid of Jonathan in 2015.
Failure to probe Adamu
The Senate summoned Bogoro over the allegation, following a motion sponsored by Senator Abdullahi Sabi, (APC, Niger north).
In 2015 Sabi alleged that TETfund under Mr Bogoro’s administration also approved and organised a workshop and pre-retreat in the United States and Kenya in 2014-2015 without recourse to the guidelines of the TETFund Act.
“A whopping sum of about N500 million was budgeted for advertising and media in TETFund’s 2015 budget,” Mr Sabi said.
“The state of infrastructure in tertiary institutions was still shabby, dilapidated and mostly run down” after government spent nearly N1trillion on the institutions between 2011 and 2015,” Sabi said.
Senate president’s concern
Following the resolution to probe TETFund, Senate President, Bukola Saraki, directed the Committee on Tertiary Institutions to report back to the Senate within a month.
The probe was to cover the diversion of the tax collected between 2012 and 2013 and used for projects not recognised in or permitted under the TETFund establishment Act, 2011.
The committee was also to look into the alleged misappropriation of funds from 2011 to 2015.
“I want the Committee to do a thorough job and within a month, report to the Senate so that we get a clearer picture of the situation,” Saraki said.
But nothing more was heard about the investigation until Mr Bogoro was reinstated in January.
Reactions following Bogoro’s return
The reinstatement of Bogoro has generated controversy as Nigerians had not been informed if he had been earlier cleared of the allegations against him.
The education minister was silent on the allegation in the statement announcing Mr Bogoro’s reinstatement.
The permanent secretary of the ministry, Sunny Echono, once told journalists that the allegedly misappropriated money was never released.
“So we discovered there is no such money that was misappropriated by him because it was never released in the first place,” he said.
Baffa’s sack became known to the staff of the agency the same day Bogoro appeared in the morning with his letter of resumption.
Will Bogoro serve Adamu?
A letter signed by the Permanent Secretary of Federal Ministry of Education addressed to Prof. Bogoro dated 21st January titled “Re-Instatement of Executive Secretary of Tertiary Education Trust Fund” said: “You shall be eligible for re-appointment for further term of 4 years only subject to satisfactory performance.”
What is the meaning of satisfactory performance? Does the letter mean Bogoro will be reappointed if he cooperates with Adamu and gives him kickback thereby swindling Nigerian tertiary institutions of learning of its intervention money?
If the TETfund and the ministry of education are not hiding anything why Adamu didn’t come out clearly and tell Nigerians Baffa’s wrongdoings? Or why did the minister and anti-graft agencies remain mute over a grave allegation of bribery by a sitting minister of the Federal Republic? What kind of mutual agreement had been signed between Bogoro and Adamu. Why Baffa has not been held for defamation of character by the minister if the accusation was untrue?
Political undertone
In Bauchi, especially among politicians, Professor Bogoro, a former lecturer with the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University (ATBU) was recalled to TETFund on political consideration.
While some welcomed his re-appointment because of “outstanding performance” as the head of the agency, others see it as “a strategic political move to strengthen the chances of the ruling APC in Bauchi state.”
Professor Bogoro was reportedly appointed by Jonathan following his nomination by former Bauchi state governor, Adamu Muazu, who served as PDP national chairman during Jonathan’s tenure up to the 2015 elections. While Bogoro hails from Bogoro local government area, Muazu is from the neighboring Tafawa Balewa local government area in the same Bauchi South senatorial district. Muazu, alongside notable politicians from Bauchi state, recently defected to APC after what sources described as “high profile political scheming”.
Former governor Isa Yuguda, also from Bauchi South, equally defected to the APC few months before Bogoro’s reinstatement. Sources said before his defection to the PDP, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, had “near absolute control” of the political apparatus in Bauchi South. So the speaker’s defection to the PDP had reduced the influence of APC in the senatorial zone. Thus the APC was trying to use Muazu and others to reclaim their firm grip of the area. A top APC official in Bauchi state said Bogoro was well grounded in Bauchi South.
“As an appointee of APC government, I have no doubt he would justify the responsibility given to him. Yes, Dogara is very strong but Prof. Bogoro would march him step by step.
“Prof. Bogoro is an elder in Bogoro, the hometown of the speaker and he too has empowered hundreds of people from across the divide and they would definitely support him to succeed,” he said.
