20-1-2025.

The local social media is awash with the story of the arrest of some official of the Katsina State Board of Internal Revenue (KTSBIR) by the Nigerian anti graft agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). The action deserves a commendation, except that the EFCC is selective in not only whom it arrests, but also who it prosecutes at the courts. Some of the times, things that are kept in its custody as evidence do disappear, leading to the arrest and even sacking of those said to be involved, as happened not long ago.

The EFCC is popularly accused of doing the government’s bidding, arresting only those it is directed to arrest and leaving the highly connected to enjoy their ill gotten wealth. Often, the agency high ranking officials are also accused of doing what they are set up to prevent, by busying themselves with the business of corruptly enriching themselves, by allegedly collecting huge amounts of money from their potential culprits.

There is also the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC), another anti corruption agency, but most of the recommendation goes to the EFCC, even though the ICPC does no less battle to curb corruption in the country.

The rebellious daughter of the President, Adetoun Tinubu once accused the current EFCC boss,Mr. Olanipekun Olukayode and the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Dr. Olayemi Cardoso, as working at cross purposes with her father, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who appointed them to their respective positions.

According to her, “the two men have been busy enriching themselves, instead of assisting the president to realise his dream of turning the economy of the country around, to be not only number one in Africa, but also to compete favourably with some of the best in the world.

She claimed that such people were very poor at the time of their present appointments to the extent that they could not afford a change of clothes for many years, because of their position of penury. However, such people were NOW so fantastically rich, that they could afford high end luxury clothes from the best shops around the world. They also own big mansions and big and fast cars, in addition to their deep pockets, she added.

Anyway, the five Katsina State Board of Internal Revenue Officials, are Rabi’u Mohammed, Sanusi Mohammed Yaro, Ibrahim M. Kofar Soro, Ibrahim Aliyu and Nura Lawal Kofar Sauri.

They were alleged to have shafted the government N1.3 billion, which they launder and shared through false accounts that they were operating for such thieving purposes.

But the EFCC arrest is better for the five if that would lead them to beg for forgiveness from all the people they have offended. It is definitely better to ask for forgiveness while we are alive in this world, where we can, than to die with the burden of others weighing down on us in the hereafter, when it is too late for us or anybody else can ask for forgiveness for the sins we committed against others while alive.

The scam committed by the five Katsina State Board of Internal Revenue officials may have been exposed by someone not taken into confidence, or someone who was not comfortable with the arrangement made with him, or for any number of reasons that may have nothing to do with ultraism.

The scandal is a clear warning that there may be others, probably on an even bigger scale than the one at the Board of Internal Revenue, waiting to be discovered in the state. It is therefore, advisable for the governor and the relevant agencies in the state, to ‘shine their eyes’ properly with a view to plugging such holes.

The state’s Chief Executive may not know all the sources of free monies coming from some donor organisations to the state, so he would do well to check, and Katsina state will be the better for it.

The ugly practice of shortchanging governments by employees is particularly rampant in the country now, in view of the very harsh and hostile economic condition that the nation has been forced into, due to the rampaging corruption that has its foundation from the very top.

For example, why would the Transmission Company of Nigeria need a humongous N2.7 trillion JUST to improve power supply to Nigerians, as claimed by the Power Minister, Mr. Adebayo Adelabu , or why is the amount of N80 billion in the 2025 budget desired to MARELY educate electric consumers on the need to constantly pay their bills, as disclosed by the same Mr. Adebayo?

The N80 billion is enough to ‘repair’ Nigeria’s power sector to provide  24 hours electricity per day in the country, unless if a substantial part of the moniesq would disappear into some very deep private pockets, a practice that is the the norm in the land these days.

Again, why would the Nigerian number one citizen insist that “there is no going back” on some of his key retrogressive economic policies, if not for the purpose of enriching himself and his region? Even the anti God addition in the tax reform bill submitted to the National Assembly (NASS), was not a good reason for the Muslim President to withdraw the bill.

It may perhaps be because the president’s people consider their tribe as coming tops, over and above their by country and their religion. A famous son of the president’s area, who made his famous name as a pen pusher, once claimed in his  newspaper column that he was “first a Yoruba man, then a Nigerian, and thirdly, a Muslim”, adding that he had  “no apology to make to anybody”.

This mindset may explain the apostasy contained in the reform tax bill, with its  ‘correction’ of Allah, Who has Divinely shared the wealth of a deceased person. God did not include the government as a beneficiary in the sharing of the wealth, but President Tinubu did, in line with the practice in the Western World, where it is called ‘death duty’.

There people who are not in support or need of any kind of money. I know of Engineer Muntari Tanimu Malumfashi, who refused to head a very ‘lucrative’ federal agency as the pioneer General Manager and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), because he feared that he might ‘get all his ‘reward’ in this world, and remain empty handed in the hereafter’.

There is also a security operative who was working in the Presidential Villa, going to every local and some international trips with the president, but was always praying for a transfer outside the Villa, because he did not want to earn ‘tainted’, money, ‘only my salary’, for fear that he will have to account for all the wealth he made in the present life, before God in the next world’.

These are postings that some people would pay millions of Naira, now only dollars are collected by those who can influence such postings, to be posted to such money-making places. In more familiar words, some people would give the proverbial (arm and leg belonging to them) to get such postings. Your guess is as good as mine, what they do to recoup their ‘investment’.

The examples are not in any way suggesting that I do not want money. Of course I do want money, lots of it in fact, but not to the extent that I would sell my country, region and people to have it. Money can only buy temporary material things, but not permanent happiness or God’s rewards in the afterlife, which we all have to go after our assigned time on earth is over.

Besides, I happen to be a weak person who will not resist the tempting temptation to dip my hand into the public till to satisfy the urges for which I am known for, which accumulation is NOT one of them, anyway.

But some people have a penchant for, and the inordinate ambition to accumulate, huge amounts of money, regardless of where the money came from and how it came about. Which perhaps explains the overwhelming corruption in the country, and the severe poverty, hunger and anger that have become the constant companions of the ordinary Nigerian citizens.

May God save us from the dual diseases of envy and bad blood all the time, especially now that we have realised the futility of such negative traits, which only lead to self harm and self destruction in the present world and damnation in the hereafter.

Malumfashi wrote from Katsina.