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HURIWA carpets Soyinka over statement on Datti Baba-Ahmed

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2 years ago

April 9, 2023

MINISTER OF CULTURE, NOA AND EFCC SHOULD WORK ON CULTURAL REORIENTATION AGAINST 419 OFFENCES BY COUPLES, YOUTHS- HURIWA Prominent civil rights advocacy group: HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (HURIWA) has called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to liaise and partner actively with credible civil rights organisations, the Federal ministry of Culture and Creative Economy and the National Orientation Agency to create massive enlightenment and sensitize couples and youths in Nigeria about the necessity of pursuing legitimate sources of income and the avoidance of all traces of advanced fees fraud in Nigeria. HURIWA raised the alarm that more and more couples and families are getting caught by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over their alleged involvement in mind-boggling and mind-blowing criminal acts of frauds and advanced fees fraud running into billions of Naira just as the Rights group said the trend should be clinically tackled from the root causes of these trends which can at best be situated around the unprecedented collapse of the hitherto respected African tradional and cultural values and the effects of unbridled materialism and unethical globalisation. HURIWA which applauded the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for calling attention to the worrying trend of married couples increasingly getting entangled in criminal cases of frauds and advanced fees fraud, also called on the anti-graft agency to think of setting up a team made up of psychologists, sociologists, Anthropologists in Nigerian Higher academic institutions to articulate learned opinions on the remote and immediate causes of the involvement of multiple numbers of couples in the disturbing cases of sophisticated fraud and then to proffer far-reaching solutions to the scandals which has deeper implications to the place of African culture and tradition globally. HURIWA recalled that recently, the Head, Cybercrime of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr Nura Buhari, attributed the increase in the number of couples committing crimes to greed and loss of traditional values. “It’s just the 21st century generation where people believe they can make money through the internet by identifying a glitch or system weakness and committing fraud,” Buhari said in an interview with one of the nation's fast growing online newspapers. The EFCC official was reacting to the rising number of couples caught by the agency for their involvement in internet fraud. On 28th November 2023, the Commission arraigned a couple, Oriyomi Idowu and Ruth Idowu, before Justice Mojisola Dada of the Special Offences Court sitting in Ikeja, Lagos over false pretence, money laundering, stealing, retention of stolen property and forgery to the tune of N2,757,188,000.00. The couple were arraigned alongside Food Commodity Processing Enterprise, Bonway Food Processing Company Limited, Samee Idowu Company Limited and Farmex Integrated Companies Limited, which all belong to Ruth Idowu. According to EFCC, sometime in 2023 in Lagos, Ruth converted the sum of N10,000,000 to purchase a GLK Benz, purchase sum derived from converting the sum of N500,000,000 belonging to Creditpro Business Support Services with the aim of disguising the illegal origin of the funds. The accused also dishonestly retained the sum of N936,619,876 in UBA account, property of Creditpro Business Support services, knowing same to be funds fraudulently obtained from Creditpro Business Support Services but the defendants pleaded “not guilty” to the charges. EFCC also arraigned another couple, Aisha Malkohi (a.k.a Ummitah, Arab Money) and her husband, Abubakar Sadiq Mahmoud (at large), over alleged fraud involving the sum of N410,518,000 meant for the purchase of cars from Saudi Arabia. They were arraigned on 8th December 2023, before Justice Aisha Mahmud at Kano State High Court after they obtained the sum of N225,259,000 belonging to Farida Ibrahim between 6th January to 16th December, 2022. The said money was reportedly paid into a Zenith Bank account bearing Abubakar Sadiq Mahmoud for the purchase and supply of 64 cars, from Saudi Arabia. But Malkohi pleaded not guilty to all the five counts read to her. Malkohi was arrested by EFCC investigators in Kano following a petition from two people–Farida Ibrahim and Ibrahim Mohammed Abdulrahman–alleging that she conspired with her husband and defrauded them under the guise of supplying them with cars, gold, electronics and kitchen utensils from Saudi Arabia. EFCC carried out an investigation that revealed the defendant had collected a total sum of N410,518,000 through bank accounts belonging to her company–Golden Grass Hill International Ltd– and her husband’s Zenith Bank account. Further investigation also revealed that the defendant, alongside her husband, who is still at large, diverted the monies into several bank accounts. On 19th December 2023, the Enugu Zonal Command of the EFCC arraigned another couple, Mr. Udeani Sunday and his wife, Udeani Amaka, before Justice M.G. Umar of the Federal High Court sitting in Enugu. They were arraigned on three-count charges bordering on obtaining the sum of N2,750,000.00 by false pretence in an alleged land fraud. According to EFCC, between 10th July 2019 to 19th December 2019 in Enugu, the couple lured one Onugu Chinyere to deliver N2,750,000.00 to them under the pretence that they’d sell a plot of land behind Ebenezer Anglican Church, Ala-Uguaji along Enugu/Port Harcourt Road to her, but like the other couples they also pleaded not guilty and the case was adjourned till February 6, 2024. "Looking at these cases and the established harmonious pattern of couples increasingly becoming partners in the crime of fraud from a deeper philosophical point of view, is actually left for philosophers and free thinkers like us to weigh in. So why are couples who ought to behave as embodiment of good behaviour and the supposed teachers of morality and ethics to their children, now turning around to become undesirable social elements?", HURIWA affirmed. Speaking further on the breaches of family cohesion and the collapse of well respected African cultural value systems, HURIWA argued that there are actually a formidable body of scholarly works on the renowned African cultural values, one of which states that in Africa, the sense of family unit, ethics and etiquette are fundamental to understanding who the African is at all times. Professor Oliver Onwubiko listed the following African cultural values: sense of community life; sense of good human relations; sense of sacredness of life; sense of hospitality; sense of the sacred and religion. HURIWA has therefore advocated a coordinated approach and the intra-governmental synergies between the EFCC, Federal ministries of information and culture and some credible CSOs, to work out a template and implement strategies for promoting the reversal of the authentic African cultural values and for families and youngsters in Nigeria to be enlightened persistently to embrace the pursuit of legitimate wealth and reject shortcuts to wealth as it were.

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Civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, (HURIWA), on Sunday, carpeted Nobel laureate and playwright, Prof. Wole Soyinka, over his criticism of the vice-presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Datti Baba-Ahmed.

HURIWA, in a statement by its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, said the respected octogenarian should stop siding with the oppressors and tyrants whom he had numerously and effusively lampooned in his nearly unending books and plays for more than five decades.

The group reiterated that there is nothing wrong in applying legal means to stop the inauguration of the President-Elect, Bola Tinubu on May 29, 2023 because the February 25, 2023 election that produced him is still being actively challenged in court by leading candidates in the poll.

HURIWA also said going by the freedom of speech articulated in the Nigerian Constitution and other African and International Charters, there is nothing wrong in the statement of the running mate to Peter Obi that Nigeria has no President-Elect yet and the Chief Justice of the Federation, Justice Kayode Ariwoola should not swear in Bola Tinubu and Kashim Shettima of the All Progressives Congress.

Soyinka in interviews on Channels Television and Arise TV followed by two statements all within a week had condemned Baba-Ahmed for his “television tirade of intimidation” which he described as “mere antics by the mentally deranged”. Saying “that aspirant’s alleged gaffe cuts no ice with me”, Soyinka challenged Baba-Ahmed to a one-on-one interview which the latter rejected on cultural and principle grounds.

He also labelled Obi’s teaming youthful followers known as Obidients as one of the most repulsive, off-putting concoctions he ever encountered in any political arena.

The playwright, however, doublespeak when he at one breath faulted voter suppression witnessed in some polling units in Lagos State during polls and in another breath said Datti and Obi should allow the court to decide.

Commenting on the media disputation between Soyinka and Datti, HURIWA’s Onwubiko said, “Prof Soyinka should avoid dancing naked in the market square so as to maintain his larger than life legendary status amongst millions of young Nigerians who are the primary victims of the misrule of the corrupt court system and political circle whom Soyinka seems to have sided with.

“There is nothing wrong with criticism and the expression of free opinion that Nigeria has no President-elect as stated by Datti Baba-Ahmed which is the bone of contention between Soyinka and the former Senator and university proprietor.

“The truth is that for some Nigerians who saw the presidential election of February 25 2023 eroded by ethical questions and manipulation of figures by the Independent National Electoral Commission, Nigeria has no President-elect yet. In the thinking of INEC, the APC’s Bola Ahmed Tinubu is President-elect but this is in dispute before the court of law.

“There’s nothing wrong with what Datti said. Indeed, the position of Soyinka supports the theory that even some assumed learned people in this 21st century Nigeria align with fascism which is represented by this tendency of seeking to impose restrictions on opinions that people should express which aren’t necessarily hate messages but opinions molded by convictions.

“We call on Soyinka to stop talking about politics because he is often siding with the oppressors and the majority of Nigerians respect him for his many books condensing tyranny.