Tinubu behind Toyin Saraki’s EFCC ordeal – Senator Waku

A former Vice-Chairman and member, Board of Trustees of the Arewa Consultative Forum, Senator Joseph Waku, has accused the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, of be­ing the mastermind of a petition which prompted the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, to invite Mrs Toyin Saraki, the wife of the Senate President for questioning.

The APC chieftain decried a situation where Tinubu will be exploring his personal relationship with the EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Lamorde, to embarrass and torment fellow party members as well as overheat the polity.

According to him: “I have chosen to speak out on this issue and make my findings on this issue known to the public. After days of painstaking enquiries, I discovered that both Tinubu and Lamorde maintain a mutually ben­eficial relationship since the days of Lamorde as the EFCC Director of Opera­tions and based in Lagos be­tween 2003 and 2007, when Tinubu was the governor of Lagos.

“I also discovered from my findings in EFCC that the so called petition against Mrs Saraki was personally given to Lamorde by Tinubu under the guise that he was submitting the petition on behalf of the APC leadership to punish Saraki for working against the party’s leadership on the choice of National Assembly leaders. This was followed by a promise to help secure a second term for Lamorde as EFCC chair­man.”

Senator Waku said he is highly disturbed that EFCC is again being dragged into the political arena to settle political scores like some years ago.

“I want to use this oppor­tunity to caution our leaders that no individual’s ambi­tion to create a fiefdom for himself should be allowed to drag our party into unneces­sary controversies and end­lessly overheat the polity.

“The party has done its part to send lawmakers to the National Assembly to work for the nation and no particular political party, and as such, they should allow our Senators and Reps mem­bers to settle down and work in the overall interest of the nation, which is far and above every other sectional interest.

“NASS leaders have al­ready emerged lawfully and no amount of arm-twisting can change votes and the proceedings of June 9, 2015, that have all been adopted by all lawmakers in both cham­bers of the National Assem­bly.

“Our leaders should stop dragging the name of Presi­dent Muhammadu Buhari and our party’s leadership into their own selfish battles. All we need now, as a nation, is to rally support for the President to enable him per­form. A lot of acts of impuni­ty have to be stopped by our self-styled party leaders. Just recently, President Buhari issued an order of proclama­tion of the 8th National As­sembly, the same self-styled party leaders went behind to carry out abominable acts to undermine the President. This cannot continue if we must convince Nigerians and the international com­munity that we deserve their support. Enough of these distractions! A word is enough for the wise.”