NAHCON’s N90bn embarrassment

YET another appointee of President Bola Tinubu has been relieved of his appointment on account of alleged official corruption and fraud. Professor Abdullahi Usman was recently appointed by the president to replace Mr. Jalal Arabi as the Executive Chairman of the National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON). Arabi, who was appointed by the president in October 2023, was removed from office over alleged corruption in the management of  the N90 billion 2024 Hajj subsidy, which is already being investigated by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). Indeed, the alleged malfeasance has seen the chairman of NAHCOM being grilled and detained by the anti-graft agency. The EFCC reportedly detained Arabi, and NAHCON’s Secretary, Abdullahi Kontagora, over alleged illegal withdrawal and mismanagement of the Hajj intervention fund.  The EFCC said it discovered that from the N90 billion Hajj subsidy, Arabi fraudulently overpaid himself and others above the necessary operational costs and that a total of SR314,098  had been recovered from the erstwhile NAHCOM chairman and other officials. The optics around the removal of Arabi from office is mixed. On the one hand, it shows the present administration’s seeming intolerance of official sleaze and the capacity to promptly sanction erring officials. But on the other, it also reveals government’s suboptimal recruitment process, especially of high-ranking officials to superintend and manage massive intervention funds and programmes.

Sometime in March this year, Dr. Betta Edu, the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, was suspended from office over allegations of fraudulent handling of intervention funds and programmes. This tendency does not bode well for the image of the administration, especially at a time when the economy is tottering and cannot brook any form of waste. Disbursing massive intervention funds to a population of needy citizens within a short time may necessarily entail the abridgement of the normal processes of official funds disbursement. The implication is that the leaders to be appointed to handle such a task should be of impeccable integrity and high standards of character and conduct, the type that would not capitalise on the somewhat relaxed bureaucratic red tape for disbursing such funds to dip their hands in the common till. It is the duty of the government to identify and recruit such patriotic and selfless managers but apparently it has failed serially in that regard.

The reported heist at NAHCON is an embarrassment to Nigeria, even as the whole world is  talking about it. Not a few Nigerians were justly miffed that the Federal Government could be contemplating Hajj subsidy at a time when the citizens were writhing in pains because of the economic hardship created by official policies, and when official support for Nigerians ought to be channeled towards the provision of basic needs. Indeed, many Nigerians were protesting against bad governance when approval was given for the subsidy. They felt that the government should not have embarked on such expenditure, but as usual, it went ahead to do what it wanted to do. To now realise that the money, which should not have been released in the first place, may have been mismanaged is terrible. This incident is bound to erode the confidence of the Saudi authorities and the international community in Nigeria. It is terribly bad optics. The question which the government does not like to answer but which must be asked time and again until it gives a definitive answer is this: why should the government be subsidizing religious pilgrimage which ought to be a private affair?

Put differently, at a time when the tendency in many civilised climes is movement away from big government, why is the Nigerian government insisting on getting involved in the private matters of its citizens, especially when it could not be said to have discharged its official responsibilities creditably?  As it stands, the Hajj subsidy did not serve the intended purpose, and that suggests that the original intention of those behind this alleged fraud had nothing to do with the masses of pilgrims. We are ashamed of this episode, especially against the backdrop of the reality that there is no guarantee that similar frauds were not committed in the past.

It is evident that the government’s penchant for imposing state obligation on what should ordinarily be private religious practice, especially at a time of critical and worsening economic situation for the country, has ended badly on all fronts. The pilgrims the government sought to extend assistance to have been allegedly shortchanged. In sum, the government has literally wasted scarce resources at a time it could ill-afford to do so.  Yes, there was a problem of increase in the cost of foreign exchange for the Hajj operation arising from government policy on foreign exchange which became a major issue for many intending pilgrims, but the fact remains that Hajj operation should not be a state obligation to the extent that it is fully or partially funded. Again, the reaction of the government to the increase in the cost of foreign exchange for Hajj operation ought not to be a peremptory allocation of humongous funds as subsidy when the pilgrims themselves were not expecting such. The foregoing is by no means a justification for the rip-off allegedly executed by the leadership of NAHCON, but if the allegation is proved, then the government inadvertently tempted morally depraved public officials to engage in gross misconduct.

It is important that the Federal Government embraces the culture of prudence in its public expenditure and prioritises the interest of the average Nigerian at all times. There are indications that the Hajj subsidy actually sought to serve a sectional interest, even though Arabi and his team allegedly scuttled the government’s suboptimal objective in the course of pursuing filthy lucre. Ultimately, this is a lesson on the corruption that defines public service processes in Nigeria which sadly reveals the utter failure of the advertised anti-corruption steps of the government over time and the need to have a critical rethink on the fight against corruption. Meanwhile, we expect the government to go beyond replacing the NAHCON chairman and ensure that all those involved in the alleged heist are made to face appropriate disciplinary measures, which must prioritise full recovery of looted or embezzled funds from. This, of course,  should be in addition to the culprits being punished to the fullest extent of the law.

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