Says LAWMAKERS victimise for refusing to sign “dubious $500m loan”
By Ologeh Joseph Chibu and Omolade Adegbuyi
The World Bank runs a scam ring in Nigeria that undermines the prospect of development in Nigeria, the Minister of Women Affairs, Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, has said.
She spoke on the rot in the country which she said involves Nigerians working with the World Bank. Of every loan World Bank gives to Nigeria, that Bank’s officials take 40 percent, she said. Nigerian currently has some $42b external debt while domestic debt is $73b.
The country continues to follow Western development framework since independence which stunts almost every aspect of her development. Efforts by the defunct USSR to help the country gain foothold in industrial take off through the Ajaokuta Steel rolling Mills were frustrates by Western powers in collaboration with global financial institutions controlled by the West.
The Minister is currently under scrutiny by Nigerian political elite.
But she said top Nigerian government officials and some members of the National Assembly are persecuting her because she refused to sign for a foreign loan worth $500m.
She said each loan obtained in Nigeria, a serving Minister is entitled to 5 percent of the fund.
She refers to a poweful cabal in Nigeria that appears to live above the law and whose activities continue to push Nigeria into the dark aisle of disrepute. The cabal appears to collaborate with Western institutions to keep the country in her perpetual state of stupor.
There has been a lingering rift between the Minister and the House of Representatives
Committee on Women Affairs and Social Development.
There was a stern face-off between the two recently at the National Assembly.
The Minister has been accused of not being able to judiciously account for N1.5 billion. But she said she was a victim of witchunting.
“There is a $500 million loan that was meant to be signed by me, but I refused to sign. There was also a case of $100 million earlier as well. Find out what it was meant for” she said in an interview with Thisday Newspapers published few days ago.
The Minister also alleged that all the loans collected by Nigeria including World Bank loans, etc are tied with kickbacks.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been called upon to investigate her allegations.
She said “Are you aware that the same World Bank staff in Nigeria takes back 40 per cent and calls it consultation fees?”
Many observers see this as a huge revelation about the scam associated with foreign loans in Nigeria which lawmakers and top civil servants are desperate to approve each time the Federal Government seeks such loans.
She said “These are things you people should look into. You people should focus on where the problem is and let them leave me alone.”
Speaking further she said “Now my life is at stake because I refused to sign the $500 million loan. Let me tell you, if I sign that loan today, I am entitled to five per cent of the money, but I refused to sign it. It is part of why the National Assembly and all of them are after me.”
The Minister said she is entitled to 5 percent of such loans obtained in behalf of the public, an indication of how deep-rooted the culture of crime and hooliganism remains in the country.
She said “And that 40 per cent they take is a secret. I found it out. Why should anybody give us a loan and you still direct us how to use the loan, and you take 40 per cent and provide us with a consultant that will take it, and they will take it?*
“I told them $100 million is too much to use to teach our women how to save money, we can teach them, let them bring the $100 million and give it to those women and use it to know what to do with their lives.”
Irohinoodua was informed by an aged World Bank official who served at the Washington Office in the 1980s that the entire world is embarrassed by the level of corruption in Nigeria.
“In our days, loans are for public interests. Today, World Bank officials and consultants who are mostly civil servants and politicians, retired and serving, collect 40% of World Bank loans and share among themselves. Of course, this would be impossible without collaboration of Banks, officials in the Presidency and the Federal civil service,” the old man who does not wish to be named told Irohinoodua. He said the World Bank in Nigeria is a “criminal enterprise” designed to keep Nigeria underdeveloped and ruined. He said the Nigerian local officials of World Bank are largely “out to milk the country to its marrows.”
Thisday quoted the Minister as saying “Let me do things that would impact lives of the people. I made sure that the action plan.”
In response, the Nigerian Human Rights Community, (NHRC) called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to set up an independent enquiry to investigate the allegations of the Minister.
“It appears Nigeria has become a criminal enterprise. The consequences include but not limited to greater public distrust and even the prospect of public uprising,” NHRC Assistant Secretary, Mallam Kudu Ibrahim told Irohinoodua on Monday.