Exposing the CBN Boko Haram “sponsor”

WHEN the Australian negotiator, Dr Stephen Davis, alleged that an unnamed top official of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) was among the sponsors of the Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria many people took his words with a pinch of salt as he had also named a former Chief of Army Staff, retired Lt Gen Azubuike Ihejirika, and former Governor Ali Modu Sheriff.

Nigeria’s Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has added his voice to this allegation, affirming that his own independent inquiries showed that the same individual is indeed culpable. He went on to say that the name of the person has been made available to the highest authority in the land.

The question on the lips of Nigerians is: who is this person? What is so special about him that he cannot even be named? Why can’t he be brought out for the public to see the person who has helped in sending thousands of Nigerians to their early graves while the nation is faced with the greatest threat to her unity since the Nigerian civil war nearly fifty years ago? Why has the CBN remained mute about this issue, since its name is being dragged to the mud? Why hasn’t the CBN seen it fit to tell Nigerians what it knows about this matter?

Happily, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), a social crusader organisation, has taken up the gauntlet and given the CBN a fourteen-day ultimatum, based on the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act. SERAP demands information about the persons involved in the money laundering and sponsorship of Boko Haram sect. A statement from the group said the CBN Governor, Mr Godwin Emefiele, is required to explain the exact nature of any such transactions.

We commend SERAP for wading into this matter clinging to the force of the FOIA. We are waiting patiently to see how the CBN under a new manager, Emefiele, will respond to this challenge. It will be a major metric for measuring the seriousness he attaches to his work and the need to keep the Bank clean of scandals.

We are greatly worried that the Presidency and the security agencies have chosen to keep the Nigerian public in the dark about the truth or otherwise of this individual’s involvement.

Although the very thought that an individual in the top echelon of Nigeria’s ultimate Bank and regulator of the financial system will become a bankroller of our enemy, yet it is only such a high level conspiracy that can make Boko Haram to grow into the monster it has become.

When this fellow is identified, tried and convicted, we will expect him to face the full wrath of the law.