The chairman, presidential advisory committee against corruption, Professor Itse Sagay, has faulted former president Olusegun Obasanjo for the gross misconduct committed while he served as the president of country between 1999 and 2007.
Prof. Sagay while speaking at a lecture organised to mark the first-year anniversary of the Lagos state House of Assembly yesterday said the Chief Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration “brought the worst season of relentless and sustained assault on federalism Nigeria ever experienced.”
Sagay listed the infractions accrued by the Olusegun Obasanjo administration to include: interference in the management of financial affairs of state governments, misuse of the EFCC and ICPC, interference in state’s local government affairs, removal of state governors using federal agencies like in Bayelsa and Ekiti, using a combination of police and political henchmen in removing governors like it happened in Oyo and Anambra, illegal declaration of state of emergency in some states as well as suspension of allocation to Lagos, Bayelsa and Ekiti states.
Further listing the errors of the Olusegun Obasanjo Administration, Prof. Sagay noted that Obasanjo ignored the constitution in 2003 and went ahead to create additional 37 local government areas.
Prof. Sagay also quoted the then Chief Justice of the country, Mohammed Uwais who said that the oath of office which the president took was to defend the constitution and that this oath did not extend to the president committing illegality.
Still addressing economic issues, Sagay alleged that the Goodluck Jonathan’s administration left almost nothing in the nation’s treasury as the former president had spent the funds on bribing people so as to retain power and win the 2015 presidential election.