Current National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu pioneered the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. Late Umaru Yar’Adua as president, booted him out of office controversial as 2008 dawned. As 2007 was rounding off, his then-boss in the Nigeria Police, IGP, Mike Okiro had put the country on notice that the acclaimed poster person for the national rebirth, championed by the Olusegun Obasanjo administration, must go for a year “compulsory” training at NIPSS, Kuru. It was euphemism for sack. Ribadu never returned to the office. On graduation ground at Kuru, he was ejected and not certificated. It took the same Yar’Adua, obviously corralling the spiraling of the young officer’s career, ordering NIPPS leadership on Nov 24, 2008, before graduation certificate was issued him. This, didn’t abate his ordeal, coordinated by then-EFCC supervising minister, AGF Mike Aondoakaa, SAN and the police leadership. Apart from being demoted and retired from police, a probe was initiated in EFCC to further dismantle his anti-corruption image. Incidentally, the day Nuhu came to write a statement, under oath, for alleged abuse of office, I ran into him, in white three-piece agbada, being seen off by Emmanuel Akomaye, then-Commission’s secretary, who also served under Ribadu.
As a reporter, covering the Commission, I nosed around enough to gather enough, to write a big exclusive story. Somehow, the editorial decision was to let go, with a big boss saying, “he served courageously, politics should not destroy him”.
So far, all his successors, have ended like him, the latest, being the 43-year-old braggart, Bawa Abdulrasheed. Call it the Ribadu curse and you may not be far from answer to why men and woman of definitely different backgrounds, ages and worldviews, would end the same way. The only thing that equally yoked them, aside being EFCC chair at different times, is all, being Northerners.
Somehow the same politics that almost incinerated Nuhu during YarAdua’s presidency, revived him when he joined forces with sectional Action Congress, to run for president, kick-starting an absolutely-rewarding relational with the leader of the sectional party who is today’s leader of Nigeria.
In his official capacity as the NSA, the Department of State Services reports to Ribadu. Bawa was arrested on June 14 by the Yusuf Bichi-led secret police and that was the last time, anyone saw him in public, though there are clues from his lawyers as proof of life. 24 hours later, the President named Nuhu his special adviser on security. 11 days after, Ribadu became the NSA, coordinating the security apparati for the Tinubu administration. For objectivity sake, let’s believe Ribadu was blindsided when the onslaught against one of his successors was launched, though he would be totally unworthy of the topmost security office if such an excuse, is offered, to defend the indefensible of keeping Bawa in chain for 102 days (as of today), without charges, trial or even an appearance in court!
Even if one feels Ribadu should not answer for a surrogate’s (Bichi) actions, when he had not assumed the supervisory role proper, the fact remains that on Nuhu’s watch, Bawa has spent 91 days in detention, without trial! If Ribadu still claims not involved, then he is just Bichi’s supervisor only on paper and Tinubu’s mere appendage as NSA. That would be a sad reality for the acclaimed cop.
Certainly, Nuhu would not want anyone to do what he is doing to Bawa, to him. Though both are Muslims, there is no way they wouldn’t have heard of the Golden Rule even if they hadn’t read the Bible. Jesus, in Luke 6:31 and Matthew 7:12 uttered the immortal words; “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”.
The Lord also warns that whatever measures you use in judging someone, shall apply to you. And because the Lord has said it, surely it shall come to pass.
Strangely, until Bawa was picked up and slammed into detention, he was almost exactly the Ribadu of two decades ago, complete with the gangly stature. It is even likely that deep down Bawa, Nuhu was his hero as a corruption fighter.
Both came into national limelight in their early 40s, Ribadu, 43 in 2003 and Bawa, almost 41, in 2021. Both were brash on the job, almost conceited, while pretending to be self-effacing, and undoubtedly dashing after national and international recognition and adulation, while forming selfless service to fatherland.
I covered Ribadu till his last day in office and with all modesty, the first to break his “banishment” to Kuru, in the front page of Nigerian Tribune’s January 1, 2008 edition. The tip came from one of his media men. I also got to see Bawa closely, though not as a reporter on the EFCC beat. Both, were almost loose cannons, working under Presidents who loved them, Obasanjo/Ribadu and Buhari/Bawa.
They didn’t only step on toes, even when unnecessary, both appeared to be pushing immortality and hero status, using the office under indulging Presidents. Bawa was almost megalomaniac at a point. Two incidents, not known to the general public, would confirm the allegations of using the office for vendetta, though I won’t necessarily classify them as abuse of office.
During the Naira reprinted imbroglio under Buhari, which Emefiele’s alleged statement has now pointed Bawa as the mastermind, the youthful EFCC chair had the temerity to phone-threat a very very senior jurist over the ruling of the apex court, nullifying the nonsensical implementation of the potentially-good policy.
Obviously because of a Buhari that removed CJNs at will, the old man let it slide.
I also know of a very very top official of the judiciary whose life Bawa made a hell, simply because the fellow who was junior to then-AGF Malami in their university days, was possibly not worshipping the alleged uncle of Bawa, enough.
Since the person in question is proposing a tell-all autobiography, I will leave the details to him, to tell, considering he wore the harassment shoes.
Tales and facts of Ribadu’s sojourn in the EFCC weren’t any different. Infact, he was more grandiose in the outlandish than Bawa. At a point, he was trying to dictate who could run for office and who should not in Nigeria, in total defiance to the Constitution, before the same Supreme Court which stopped Bawa and Buhari, on the Naira project, stopped Nuhu and Obasanjo, from becoming the law.
Yoruba will say, efa da ninu eje (not so much difference between six and seven). What makes Bawa’s alleged Naira redesign sin looks more grievous is disrupting ordinary people’s daily bread, while Ribadu only tried to deny politicians, power. While Ribadu still generated uproar with his ban-list of 2007, Bawa and co.,simply invited people’s wrath, hence the barely-noticeable public sympathy for him.
But lack of popular support won’t make his endless incarceration right, constitutionally, et al. Beyond legality, there is always the angle of a King Pharaoh in power, who would not know or fancy Joseph’s accomplishment. It was Yar’Adua for Ribadu. It is Bola Tinubu for Bawa.
Yar’Adua and Ibori likely thought they buried Ribadu but he resurrected. Bawa can be a comeback kid too, who knows, if another Sheriff who doesn’t fancy Nuhu, shows up in town, after Tinubu.
The NSA, by now, should know that there is definitely life after office and shouldn’t make his mind as lean as his body frame. As for Bawa, he should seize this moment of grief, to transmogrify into a better person, regardless of the fate awaiting him in the next four or eight years.
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