Former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s assertion that his former deputy, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar cannot travel to the United States of America, USA, because he risks arrest over corruption allegation has been debunked as untrue and a distortion of facts.
Atiku, who is currently in China on a business trip at the invitation of that country’s government, was responding to statements credited to Obasanjo in an interview he granted “Zero Tolerance,” a magazine produced by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
In a statement Wednesday by his media adviser, Garba Shehu, Atiku Abubakar, who noted that the allegations leveled against him “were not true,” said, “The former President is wrong. It is widely known that Atiku didn’t enter government broke. He declared his assets at the commencement of his Vice Presidency and did so at the end of his term as required by the constitution, which is a sacred document to Atiku.
“Atiku, who is currently returning from China after leading a private economic trade mission at the invitation of the Chinese government, travels often and has a well-documented record of building industries and putting thousands of Nigerians to work. And this record, quite frankly, has been thoroughly investigated.”
The media aide noted that his boss had no case against him by any arm of the law in any country in the world, including the United States, saying, “President Obasanjo’s repeated ‘jokes’ about Turaki not being able to go to America have become cliché, tiresome and not true.”
He further recalled that sometime in 2006, then President Obasanjo sent his National Security Adviser (NSA) to stop Atiku from travelling to the US, saying that the Vice President risked arrest on arrival. He said that Turaki spurned that advice, left Nigeria to land at the Andrews Air Force Base, the official airport of the US government, to receive the best reception ever on a visit to America.
“So, we are used to those taunts,” he added.
The former vice president’s spokesman noted that when Atiku left office in 2007 shortly before the inauguration of late Umar Musa Yar’Adua as president, he spent three months in the US, adding that if they (US authorities) wanted him for anything, they would have met him, adding, “It is time to start dealing in facts. Specifically, the fact that Atiku’s visa to visit the United States has been recently renewed.
“Another fact is Atiku is one of the most investigated politicians in Nigerian history. And every investigation, whether politically motivated here at home or by the FBI abroad, has yielded the same result every time: not guilty.
“If Atiku is guilty of anything, it is crushing persistent attempts at re-writing our constitution.
“Atiku has chosen the path of optimism and hope. Moving forward, he will continue working to fuel Nigeria’s economy through investment and job creation, while also passionately and persistently defending our young democracy.”
If Atiku was corrupt under OBJ’s presidency and OBJ did not
successfully prosecute, convict and jail him but actually returned him as VP in
his second term and kept him till the end, then he (OBJ) was a failed president
and is lying to us and never represented our best interest as sworn in his oath.