Professor Tam David-West was Minister of Petroleum Resources under General Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, as Military Head of State (January 1, 1984 – August 25, 1985). He has made some remarkable and resoundingly daring statements challenging accusers of the man, who has since returned in agbada to the seat of power, to spot out one or half misdoing of him or his former offices with no one having such guts. He said:
¤ Buhari is one of the cleanest men I have ever met in my life. If anybody wants me to dislike Buhari, such person should give me an example of his corruption. I will run away from him totally. But right now, there is no evidence. On the contrary, the more they attack him on this issue of corruption, the more they are making him Gold bier.
¤ I will give two examples:
¤ One, Babangida thought Buhari was making a lot of money on counter trading, so he set up two independent bodies to investigate counter trading.
¤ One of the bodies was headed by J.K. Randle, while the second was headed by Prof. Aboyade of blessed memory. None of them found anything against Buhari. None. I attested before the two bodies.
¤ Great Aboyade commission was digging into Buhari’s counter trading, J.K. Randle, who’s still alive, did the same thing.
¤ But both of them produced reports that showed that counter trading was so clean and was making so much money for Nigeria.
¤ Then two, soon after Obasanjo was sworn in, there was a social function for him in Lagos or so, then surprisingly, some people tried to praise Buhari, Obasanjo said: ‘don’t praise him, I have not probed him.’ It was after that incident that Obasanjo set up Dr. Haroun’s probe panel of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF).
¤ Haroun probed PTF inside out. Buhari was discovered to be as clean as snow.
¤ You know, why he agreed to be the head of PTF was not to condone what Abacha was doing then, but he saw it as a way of serving the country and he did well. I have the record.
¤ Haroun came out and said PTF account was audited every year while Federal Government account was not audited in 36 years.
¤ You know Babangida detained Buhari for 40 months after he overthrew him.
¤ Buhari’s mother died while he was in detention and as a Muslim, I expected Babangida to rise above politics and allow Buhari to go bury his mother. If he was released, I am sure he wouldn’t have run away.
¤ Buhari was not allowed to go bury his mother. But in the night after the woman was buried, Babangida released Buhari.
¤ His son died, the same thing happened.
¤ Anyway, after Buhari came out of detention, he told Babangida to tell the world about his corruption. The records are there.
¤ The same thing happened with the PTF. He told Obasanjo to publish the report of the panel, but Obasanjo could not publish it because it was a certificate of honour for Buhari. If that Haroun’s report had any page in it that indicted Buhari, Obasanjo would have used that to disqualify Buhari from contesting against him.
¤ Buhari is clean. He is not corrupt.
¤ To show how Buhari loves Nigeria, he doesn’t like spending Nigerian money frivolously. When Shehu Shagari’s NPN government was overthrown, as Buhari was assigned to head the Military government of 1983, he never changed any chair or curtain in Dodan Barracks. Buhari used what Shagari was using until his government was also overthrown by IBB and co.
¤ As minister, our total pocket money under Buhari was N200 per month. You could spend less than N200 without accounting for it, but anything above N200, you must account for it.
¤ When he increased the money to N250, we clapped for him at the executive council.
¤ Now, as a former governor of the defunct north-eastern state, former minister of petroleum, former head of state, former executive chairman of PTF, Buhari has no house in Abuja.
¤ If he goes to Abuja, he stays in a private hotel. He has no house either uphill or downhill, apart from his house in Kaduna.
Nigerians, We Need BUHARI by 2019.
PROFESSOR TAM DAVID WEST, Former Nigeria’s Petroleum Minister.
