Pubdate: Sat, 23 May 2009 Source: Punch (Nigeria) Copyright: 2009 The Punch Contact: http://www.punchng.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4933 Author: John Ameh Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?236 (Corruption - Outside U.S.) NDLEA CARTEL: 62 INDICTED OFFICIALS STILL IN SERVICE There are fresh indications that the authorities of the Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency may have shielded the members of a powerful jail-evasion cartel in the agency from punishment, contrary to the recommendations of the Justice Gilbert Obayan (rtd) National Committee for Reform of the NDLEA. Rather than retire the original 71 officials of the agency indicted by the committee, investigations by Saturday Punch showed that only nine had been retired while the NDLEA sacrificed the career of 62 other innocent officers to make up the number, thereby shielding members of the cartel. The cover-up was said to have been done to stop the powerful cartel from executing its alleged threat to expose some former and serving top-level management personnel who had aided its illegal activities. The immediate-past Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of the Federation, Chief Bayo Ojo, had set up the committee in October 2006 to examine the administrative and operational machinery of the agency and make recommendations for improvement. It submitted its report in February 2007, about four months to the expiration of the tenure of former President Olusegun Obasanjo. Among the panel's five terms of reference were to "identify officials and other personnel of the NDLEA who have engaged in any inappropriate conduct and make recommendations for appropriate sanctions" and to "examine the circumstances leading to the evasion of jail terms by offenders prosecuted by NDLEA, who were convicted but were never found in prison; and to identify officials of the agency and any of the public services found to have connived with the convicts." Saturday Punch had reported exclusively last April that the cartel, with the connivance of 14 lawyers and 11 prison wardens, had aided 197 drug barons and convicts to escape serving jail sentences. The Obayan committee had also indicted some members of the cartel for alleged corrupt practices, including contract inflation and diversion of funds running into several millions of naira. Saturday Punch gathered that among the officers sacrificed in 2007 to keep their 62 indicted colleagues in service were some state commanders who were not told the nature of their offence. Their letters were signed by the current Director-General of the agency, Mr. Lanre Ipinmisho, who was the Secretary of the board. However, the official list of the 71 officers retired by the agency to pre-empt the outcome of the Obayan committee's findings, showed that only nine members were on the committee's list while the remaining 62 were included by the authorities of the agency to cover up the cartel. Following a petition by the affected officers, the House of Representatives Committee on Drugs, Narcotics and Financial Crimes had summoned Ipinmisho two times this year, but on both occasions, he was reportedly unable to provide evidence of any wrongdoing to justify the mass retirement. A source close to the committee told Saturday Punch that "during his last meeting with the committee in April 2009, Ipinmisho had stated that the American Drug Enforcement Agency applauded the decision of the board to retire the officers. "He went back and promised to come with more evidence, but he has not kept his promise." But a letter to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr. Dimeji Bankole, by the President of the Alabama-Africa Trade and Economic Cooperation Forum and former Head of the DEA in Nigeria , Mr. Gorge Williams, disproved Ipinmisho's claims. In the letter, dated May 8, 2009, Williams expressed shock that the name of the American agency was being linked with the unjustifiable retirement of officers by the NDLEA. Part of the letter read, "I would like to express my concern over the use of the DEA Office in Lagos and that of other similar foreign law enforcement agencies in Nigeria by the present head of the NDLEA, Mr. Giade, to justify his mass sack of 71 NDLEA employees. "I am most concerned with the name-dropping of our embassy in Lagos by the NDLEA to justify this action. "I am very much encouraged to draw your attention to this matter for your intervention because several other top US officials and diplomats who have worked in Nigeria as well as eminent Nigerians have equally expressed same concern and the need for this injustice to be reviewed. "I have also been informed that the then Minister of Justice, Mr. Bayo Ojo, the supervisor of the NDLEA, confirmed that he never endorsed such an action especially when persons who had earlier voluntarily retired and someone who had died two years before the retirement exercise were all included in the list." However, reacting on Friday, Ipinmisho defended the action of the authorities saying that the retired officers "have no case" because the NDLEA no longer required their service. He said, "We did reorganisation in the agency as approved by Mr. President; NDLEA is a government agency and works according to laid down rules." When reminded of the allegation that most of the principal officers indicted by the committee were still in service, he replied that the reorganisation was still "open; any of them found will be shown the way out." - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake