By Olawale Ajileye
Diezani Alison-Madueke, former Minister of Petroleum Resources, made many men by her power and wile. Like the proverbial phantom of the crossroads, by whose legendary wishes desperate men attain their heart’s desires, she elevated ordinary men from bumbling entrepreneurs to overnight billionaires while she presided over the country’s oil industry.
But having made billionaires and aristocrats of such lowly men, she has decided to unmake them. As the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) prepares a watertight case against her, Diezani has decided to toss under the train, most of her former associates and cohorts in the grand scheme by which they fleeced Nigeria of outrageous revenue from the country’s petro-business.
Today, Diezani has become the nemesis of many bank chiefs and oil magnates. Sources within the EFCC revealed that she has started singing like a nightingale,churning out names of her cohorts after she came to the discomforting realisation that many of them were desperately trying to leave her to her fate.
Until she started revealing their identities, many of the bank chiefs and oil magnates that were involved in one shady deal or the other with her, allegedly stopped picking her calls. They deserted her and left her to roast in the heatof the EFCC’s anticorruption campaign. This allegedly infuriated Diezani and she swore to bring all of her cohorts down with her.
Just recently, Nnamdi Okonkwo, former Fidelity Bank Managing Director (MD), was arrested by the EFCC over fraud related charges. Okonkwo was arrested by the EFCC for allegedly receiving $115million in slush fund from former the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani.
The money was allegedly used to bribe officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to rig the 2015 presidential election in favour of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan. The fraud was uncovered when the EFCC began investigations into how officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission in Rivers, Delta and Akwa Ibom states received N675.1m.
Finding srevealed that Okonkwo was actually introduced to Diezani by former governor of Anambra State, Peter Obi. Obi reportedly took Okonkwo to Diezani claiming he is the most dependable guy she could work with in distributing the illicit $115million slush fund. Promptly, Diezani took to Obi’s advice and co-opted Okonkwoin her grand scheme to rig the March 28 general elections in favour of her former principal and ex-president, Jonathan.
While the plunder lasted, friends of the former petroleum minister and her closest associates profited immensely by their association with her. They made what isknown in high society parlance as ‘mad money.’ They acquired private jets at will and flew across the world to acquire choice properties in exclusive neighbourhoods of the global rich.
Now that the bauble has burst, many of the men and women that looted the country and profited illicitly by their association with Diezani are set to face retribution by the long arm of the law. And Diezani is leaving no stone unturned to unmask them and bring them down with her into the EFCC’s net.
