…It’s a lie – Report
Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, on Monday revived a controversy surrounding the role allegedly played by President Muhammadu Buhari’s wife, Aisha in the bribery scandal involving U.S. Congressman, Williams Jefferson.
Fayose distributed a link to the U.S. Department of Justice website holding court documents where Mrs. Buhari was alleged to have transferred suspicious funds to a convicted former American congressman, Williams Jefferson.
This was contained in a statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary, Idowu Adelusi.
. Fayose according to the statement said President Buhari was far from being a clean man.
“Even the President cannot claim to be an angel,” the governor said, in reaction to the freezing of his Zenith Bank account by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
“The estate he built in Abuja is known to us. His wife was indicted over the Halliburton Scandal (sic). When that American, Jefferson, was being sentenced, the President’s wife was mentioned as having wired $170,000 to Jefferson. Her name was on page 25 of the sentencing of Jefferson. We can serialize the judgment for people to see and read.”
Fayose’s Special Assistant on New Media, Lere Olayinka, also circulated links to and copies of the court document detailing Mrs Buhari’s mention in the scandal.
The documents indicated that in some of the exhibits tendered in convicting Mr. Jefferson of bribery, a Mrs. Buhari was mentioned as transferring $170,000 to the American politician using a firm as proxy.
“Government Exhibits 36-87 (6/26/02 $170,000 wire transfer from account in Nigeria in the name of Aisha Buhari to an account in the name of The ANJ Group, LLC, identifying “William Jefferson” as Beneficiary),” the U.S. Government Sentencing Memorandum said on page 22.
Mrs. Buhari could not be reached for comments. And Presidential spokesman, Femi Adesina, declined comments, saying he would need to check the documents himself before issuing an official statement.
Reports say Fayose’s comment sparked a recollection of how Jefferson, between 2000 and 2005, used his position as member of the U.S. House of Representatives to offer illegal services to private companies for cash rewards.
Jefferson and his family, according to U.S. authorities, received about $367,500 through his firm, ANJ Group, for services rendered to iGate, an American broadband technology provider.
An indigenous firm, Netlink Digital Television, had signed a joint venture with iGate to set up digital satellite TV and broadband Internet services in the country. NDTV was owned by Oyewole Fasawe, a PDP chieftain at the time.
Jefferson was contracted to help promote iGate and NDTV partnership in Nigeria.
Following a lengthy trial, Mr. Jefferson was convicted in 2009 and sentenced to 13 years in prison.
Although, Fasawe was arrested in 2005 by the EFCC, he was never convicted.
Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar were also said to be a person of interest in the allegations.
A report released by the EFCC on June 22, 2006 about the bribery scandal indicated that the commission investigated accounts held by Mrs. Buhari, including one she had with Citizens Bank.
A 2007 New York Times’ article detailed how Mrs. Buhari told an acquaintance in Washington that she was a daughter of a former Nigerian head of state and a friend of Mr. Jefferson.
“As the pair struck up a conversation and subsequently became friends, Mr. Assiba, then a security guard, said she told him that her father was the former military ruler of Nigeria, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, and that her American friends included politicians like Mr. Jefferson of Louisiana.”
Meanwhile, an online publication, THEWILL says it can authoritatively report that the Ekiti State Governor lied deliberately against the President’s wife by claiming she was indicted in the Halliburton scandal
Checks by THEWILL reveal that the said ‘Aisha Buhari’ bandied by Fayose has no links whatsoever with the President.
A 2007 report by the NYTIMES on the matter clearly show that this Ms Buhari, linked to the Halliburton scandal, is neither the President’s wife nor daughter.
According to the report, ‘Ms. Buhari’ claimed to be working for Victor Attah, former Governor of Akwa Ibom state, who had asked her to look for consultants and lawyers who could help him pressure oil companies like Exxon Mobil to clean up pollution in the Nigerian state.
She met a Mr. Assiba, who was scouting investors for his own African projects and had been introduced earlier to Richard T. Hines. The lobbyist, Mr. Assiba told Ms. Buhari, was just the man Mr. Attah needed.
Attah and Mr. Hines came to terms and the Nigerian official agreed in the late summer of 2005 to pay him $1.2 million for a year’s work.
According to the contract and lobbying records, Mr. Hines’s duties included meetings with government officials in Washington seeking aid for Akwa Ibom, finding companies and investors to come to the Nigerian state, and publicizing its economic opportunities.
“Despite the large amount of money that Mr. Attah paid Mr. Hines, the politician said he never looked into the backgrounds of either the lobbyist or the associates who followed Mr. Hines to Nigeria. If he had, he might have found that some of those associates had interesting backgrounds. In fact, a few of them had already been in Africa the year before to seek work from another client of Mr. Hines, the government of the nearby nation of Gambia,” the report stated.
“As for Ms. Buhari, who is living in Virginia, it’s not clear who she really is. For one, she is under investigation in Nigeria by its Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, said its head, Nuhu Ribadu.
“Ribadu said he is uncertain if her name is Aisha Buhari, but he added that she is not a daughter of General Buhari” adding that American authorities suspect that Ms. Buhari may have served as a financial conduit for the politician. Mr. Jefferson and also testified before a grand jury investigating the congressman, who is suspected of soliciting bribes from American companies seeking business in Nigeria.
Even the President had denied knowing or having a relationship with her.
“I don’t have any relationship with that Aisha Buhari,” Mr Buhari said. “I don’t have any daughter called Aisha Buhari living outside this country. She is not my daughter.”
One wonders why Fayose will deliberately ignore the facts and indict the Wife of the President over a matter that she isn’t involved with.
