Posted on: 08:25 Mon, 21 Mar 2016



Former President Olusegun
Obasanjo has slammed those asking
him to account for recovered
Abacha loot, describing them as
illiterates.

“They said the money recovered
from Abacha, I should account for
it. What stupidity! The man who
asked for it, the man who gave the
judgement or who answered them
are all stupid, with due respect,”
Obasanjo said in an interview over
the weekend.

“I don’t keep account, all Abacha
loots were sent to the Central Bank
of Nigeria, CBN, and every bit of it
was reported to Minister of
Finance. My job was to write where
we can get help to recover the
money.

“Every penny that comes out of it
went to CBN, so if they want to
know what happened to the money,
they should call CBN governor or
call the Minister of Finance.

“But again, it shows ignorance,
total ignorance, which is lacking
and you wonder, are these people
educated? They can also approach
the man who helped us in
recovering process to give the list
of money recovered and where he
took it,” the former president said.

Commenting on the current low
prices of oil, Obasanjo described
President Muhammadu Buhari as
lucky. “When I assumed office in
1999, I inherited $3.7 billion in
reserve, while Buhari met $30
billion, almost 10 times of what I
met then, and the price of oil then
was $9. When it got to $20, I was
dancing.

“I know the price is down now and
with time, it will jump up again.

What Buhari is doing currently is
preparing ground for Nigeria to
take advantage when it goes up
again,” Obasanjo said.

He also said he sees nothing wrong
in Buhari’s frequent foreign trips.

“He needs to be known and to
know people. How do you make
friends and influence people except
you know them and this cannot
happen if he sits in Aso Villa,
especially in a situation that we
found ourselves, a situation where
we have bad image in the world, a
situation where we need to play
leadership role, especially in Africa,
because during Jonathan’s
administration, Nigeria was not on
the table.”

However, he says he has no regret
putting Goodluck Jonathan forward
as President, saying his objective
had been achieved by making a
minority group to produce the
president of Nigeria.

“I believe that Nigerian politics will
be strengthened even more if we
have the opportunity to allow the
minority in its own right to emerge
as President, and I do not have any
apology for anybody because the
purpose I wanted Nigeria to
achieve had been achieved.

“That any Nigerian can become
president, it is not a regret for
Nigeria and for me because Nigeria
gave him that opportunity, he used,
abused, misused as he wished and
at the appropriate time, Nigerians
said thank you for what you have
done and what you have not done
and Nigeria said bye bye, which is
the beauty of democracy.”