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| Dr. (Mrs.) Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. |
By Owei Lakemfa.
I first met Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala during the Obasanjo
administration at a conference organised by the newly emergent
Due Process Office headed by Mrs. Obiageli (Oby) Katryn Ezekwesili.
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| Comrade Owei Lakemfa. |
Okonjo-Iweala was Minister of Finance, so I asked her how
much oil Nigeria was producing daily. Conference Chairman, Mallam Nasir
El-Rufai (Now Governor of Kaduna State) fumed: “Mr. Lakemfa, let me
tell you, there are three persons I can die for in this government; Oby, Ribadu
(Nuhu, then Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission) and
Ngozi.” He did not allow her to answer the question. I doubt if until today, it
is a question she can answer.
Okonjo-Iweala was an instrument for the perpetuation
of the enslaving policies of the IMF and World Bank. In her 2018 book “Fighting
Corruption Is Dangerous: The Story Behind the Headlines” she admitted
being a stooge of those organisations. In it,
she wrote of her reaction to the January 1, 2012 fuel
price increase: “I told my husband that I was sure that I would be
blamed if things did not go right because everyone would feel
that in my rush to implement so-called neoliberal policies
informed by the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, I had rushed the
President into this decision.”
Okonjo-Iweala as Finance Minister from 2003-2006 was
one of the main forces that drove the Obasanjo administration’s privatization
process in which choice public property like the profit-making
670-room luxuriously furnished Nicon-Noga Hotel(Renamed Transcorp)
were sold. My primary point on this issue is that the funds realised from these
prodigal sales were not accounted for by the Iweala-controlled Finance Ministry
or any other government arm, nor were Nigerians told the public
projects on which these funds were expended.
Okonjo-Iweala was the pivot of the controversial 2005 debt
repayment project to the Paris Club. The debts were said to be $30 Billion under
which $18 billion was written off as aid while the country made an outright
payment of $12 billion. First, there was the controversy whether
these debts were verifiable. Secondly, whether it made sense for an
underdeveloped country to make a bulk payment of $12 billion. But
the main controversy was whether in paying the Paris Club, Nigeria needed
“Consultants” or “Advisors” who were paid huge commissions.
Nigerians asked Okonjo-Iweala to name these middlemen and
exactly how much they were paid. This, to the best of my knowledge has not been
done fifteen years later.
In 2010, the labour unions had differences with
government over the new National Minimum Wage of N18,000. We
thought the then Secretary to the Government, Senator Pius Ayim was
not forthcoming so elected to meet President Jonathan. After he sorted out the
issue, we told him there were rumours Dr. Okonjo-Iweala was to be brought back
as Finance Minister, and stated reasons for our objection. President Jonathan
noted Labour’s objection, but went ahead not only to bring her back
as Finance Minister, but also as the
‘Coordinating Minister for the Economy’ A sort of Prime
Minister.
When in 2011, the administration flew the kite of an
astronomical increase in fuel price, she went into over drive with
her propaganda machinery. As this heated up the polity, President Jonathan
invited the Labour unions to a meeting on December 19, 2011 in the Presidential
Villa. I was then the Acting General Secretary of the Nigeria Labour Congress
(NLC) Okonjo-Iweala with slides, briefed us
on government’s position. She made the usual
windy arguments about the increase being based on
transparency, oil subsidy mainly benefiting the rich,
need to attract private investors, curb fuel smuggling
and that PMS prices should be subjected to so-called market forces
as had happened to the telecommunication and aviation sectors.
She claimed that the landing cost of a litre of PMS was
N139. First we showed that her statistics were faulty and asked her how much a
litre would cost were the country to do local refining. She had no answer, so
with statistics, we provided the answer; N40!
Then she claimed that the country consumed “35
to 40million” litres of PMS daily. We argued that since almost all the PMS is
dispensed from petrol stations, she should tell us the number of such stations
and their holding capacity. She could not, and we provided the information that
the entire capacity of the fuel stations was between 20-25 million litres. In
other words that her claimed 35-40 million-litre consumption, was
false. She began to shout: “ I don’t lie o! Nobody should call me a liar!!”
An apparently embarrassed President Jonathan calmed her
down and requested we adjourned the meeting to the New year,
2012 during which Labour would present its counter
statistics to those of the Minister. That meeting never held as the
Government on January 1, 2012, announced the fuel price increase. The reactions
were massive protests that heralded the end of that administration.
Later, revelations showed that while the Executive with
Okonjo-Iweala as Co-ordinating Minister claimed the country was paying daily
subsidy for 35-40 million litres, the truth from the record of
payments through the Petroleum Products
Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) was that the country was paying
subsidy for 59 million litres per day! This daily 19-24
million litre subsidy difference, is called fraud.
Also under her watch, the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation
(NNPC) rather than pay all monies accruing to the country into the Federation
Account as constitutionally provided, first paid itself whatever
amount it wanted before paying the balance into the account. Also, the PPPRA
which was not importing fuel was being paid an average ‘fuel
subsidy’ of N150 Billion annually. While the subsidy provision for
2011 was N245.96 Billion, the Finance Ministry under Okonjo Iweala paid
N2,587.087 trillion.
Another revelation was that she hired two audit firms; Akintola
William Deloitte and Olusola Adekanla and Co to verify
subsidy claims before payments were made. But the House of
Representatives found that the firms had no adequate knowledge of measuring
products in a vessel before and after discharge. So the
firms were simply: “participating in a bazaar and collecting
N275,000.00 per vessel.”
It was indeed, a bazaar;
while Okonjo-Iweala paid oil subsidy
to five companies in 2006, in
2011, for generally the same level of consumption, she paid 140
companies! Anybody interested in these details can pick up a copy of
my 2015 book “Parliament of the Streets: Mass Strikes and Street Protests that
Shook Nigeria in 2012” I cannot in clean conscience,
recommend Okonjo-Iweala for any job.
On the shark WTO, while it is true Okonjo-Iweala is a Nigerian
and an African, but of what comfort is it to the forest that the handle of the
sharp axe cutting down its trees is made of wood from the
forest?
·
Comrade Lakemfa is a journalist, renown labour
leader and activist.
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