Dr. Ngozi Okonjo- Iweala held the pivotal Finance Ministry and Economic Co-ordination Ministry which has been described as corrupt. The Economist stated that corruption flourished under her watch “who let politicians and their cronies fill their pockets with impunity”. Up to €20 billion was alleged to have gone missing. She was at the heart of this Ministry.
Nigeria has supported a dual citizen whose tainted tenure has been described as corrupt. Some specific allegations were leveled at Okonjo -Iweala in 2015 for her alleged role in the diversion of the proceeds of looted funds in security spending – up to €2bn was transferred to the National Security Advisor with little oversight and accountability. She had argued that she had advised the President of the need for accountability in the spending of the funds, but civil society groups have claimed that there was no accountability.
READ ALSO: Nigeria: N30 Trillion Lost Under Okonjo-Iweala’s Watch – Soludo
There is no suggestion that Okonjo-Iweala misappropriated funds, but given her pivotal position as Finance Minister and Minister with responsibility for coordinating the Economy, questions were focused on could she have done more to prevent others doing so?
In May 2016 the Federal High Court in Lagos ordered Dr. Okonjo- Iweala to account for N30 trillion which was some of the accruable income to the Federal Government during the last four years of the administration of former President Goodluck Johnathan.
The Court case was taken by a civil society Group – the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project – SERAP which had sought information from Dr. Okonjo -Iweala and the Federal Government under Freedom of Information legislation.
She resisted the application but the Court held in favor of SERAP – the executive director of SERAP said that the judgment shows the important role that the Nigerian Courts will play in efforts to promote transparency in Government and combat corruption. “ It also confirms that high ranking government officials can no longer escape accountability for their actions which in office.”
In 2007, Dr. Okonjo- Iweala had been ordered by the Federal Appeal Court in Abuja to refund an ILLEGAL dollar salary that she was paid when she was hired from the World Bank to be appointed Finance Minister.
When appointed she had sought payment in foreign currency but following pressure was forced to accept the currency in local Nigerian currency – the Naira. Following the ruling, she was expected to refund between $300,000 to $400,000 to the Nigerian Government deemed to be excess of salaries drawn while holding office.
Dr.Ngozi Okonjo- Iweala hid the fact that in 2019 she was sworn in as a US citizen. Every new US citizen swears an oath giving up allegiance and loyalty to any other country. In all her documents submitted to the WTO submitted in July 2020, including her very detailed CV, there is no mention of her being a US citizen. It was exposed by Bloomberg news in September 2020. Is she a USA candidate or a Nigerian candidate?
Why the lack of transparency?
All these facts are public and can be easily checked. How can any country support a candidate to head the WTO where there is a clear issue of integrity? How can a person with serious corruption allegations and integrity issues be considered to lead the WTO to reform and making the multilateral trading system work?
Transparency is key to success at turning around the WTO.
How can a candidate who’s proven to lack transparency succeed?
With her underperformance at the World Bank as the Vice President for Africa Region, Ngozi Okonjo-Olwala, the Nigerian and American candidate is not poised to implement the reform agenda in WTO. Very low results were recorded for Africa when she was at the World Bank. The Nigerian-USA Candidate was several times accused of corruption during and after her tenure as Finance Ministry in her birth country Nigeria. At WTO she will not achieve much, and the reforms are not something member countries can expect from her.
With so many negative traits, she has at some point been perceived as a bully, bad listener, know it all manager not interested in listening to opinions, especially divergent and contrary views from anybody. She will not foster cohesion within the members. She lacks integrity a fact that can be demonstrated by the non-disclosure of her American citizenship at the time of presenting her nomination. Her dual citizenship was unearthed by a conscientious journalist who exposed her fraud to the WTO members.
African countries believes also that Ngozi will not be able to bring Africa back to reasonable discussion and away from the narrative on policy space because of her past at the World Bank which was not fruitful to Africa while she could do more for her continent. She does not have the interest of Africa on her mind.
The dual American & Nigerian candidate was caught up in Nigeria in a widening $2 billion arms procurement scandal which led to the arrest of the former Nigerian national security adviser with former Governors, businessmen, and the Governor of the Bank. In Nigeria Ngozi Okonjo – Iweala was centered around the deployment of funds recovered as part of the looting by the former military dictator, Sani Abacha.
In the 1990s as the Minister of Finance, she was accused of being fully aware of inconsistencies in how the recovered funds were spent. Is this really a leader that WTO deserves?
Dr. Okonjo-Iweala, having served as a key member of her government was aware of this large-scale corruption due to her involvement in the transfer of funds to the national security adviser with little oversight and accountability, involved in the illegal diversion of repatriated funds of up to $322 million in Nigeria.
She was a key architect of the divisive and repugnant Biafranization of Nigeria. This project badly scared many Nigerians. MERCURY, the PR Lobbyist firm that is leading her campaign was heavily involved in the planning and execution of this project.
Her selection will damage the image of WTO and member countries will have to take this matter seriously without being drawn into the mistake of following some glitzy campaign manifestos. Her army of a campaign team is drawn from shadowy characters and is heavily financed by wealthy benefactors who are driven by selfish interests.
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Source: regionweek.com
