EFCC declares El-Rufai wanted

Trouble is far from being over for the former Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai.
Accused of abusing public office, banned by the Senate from holding public office, El-Rufai who once bestrode the nation’s political terrain like a colossus has now been declared wanted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission EFCC).
A statement by the Commission says the former minister “is wanted for abuse of office and misappropriation of public funds to the tune of N32 billion.”

The anti-graft agency said the need to declare El- Rufai wanted became imperative following his failure to honour a simple invitation from the commission to respond to weighty allegations levelled against him in petitions being investigated by the Commission.

The Commission had written El- Rufai some weeks ago to appear before it on November 28, 2008. Instead of honouring the invitation, he wrote back through his counsel asking the EFCC to send its questions to him. He had claimed then that he was writing an examination outside the country.

This prompted the Commission to grant him another three weeks grace.
According to the EFCC statement, “instead of seizing the opportunity to respond to the weighty allegations against him, he has resorted to a hide and seek game, and an appalling show of impunity on the pages of newspapers.”

Trouble began for the former FCT boss who was nicknamed “Bulldozer” because of the series of demolition exercise he carried out during his tenure.
Following the public outcry and the avalanche of petitions against him, the upper chamber of the National Assembly set up a panel to look into the tenure of the petit but powerful El-Rufai and other former occupants of the exalted office of FCT minister.

In its report, the Senate Committee indicted El-Rufai among other crimes for abuse of office. He was said to have allocated thousands of plots of lands when he had ceased to be minister, revoking government lands for reasons of overall public interest and later re-allocating such lands to individuals and members of his family and disobedience to court orders and so many other allegations.

Consequently, he was banned from holding public office.
According to Senator Anthony Agbo, a member of the panel, the decision to slam a ban on El-Rufai was borne out of the need to “reduce the culture of political administrative impunity and recklessness when you are in office”.
But El-Rufai had always dismissed charges of wrong-doing hauled at him maintaining that he did his best for the nation.