Lagos lawyer, Femi Falana, has kicked against
suggestions that Nigeria should sell off its national
assets to raise funds for the country’s ailing
economy.
Nigeria’s business mogul and Africa’s richest
man, Aliko Dangote, had suggested that the
federal government should sell off some national
assets like the multi-billion dollar Nigeria Liquefied
Natural Gas Limited, NLNG, and use the proceeds
to pull the country from the current economic
recession.
“If I had challenges in my company, I would not
hesitate to sell assets to remain afloat, to get to
the better times. It doesn’t make any sense for
me to keep any assets and then suffocate the
whole organization,” Mr. Dangote, who is the
chairman, Dangote Group, told CNBC Africa.
“We have a lot of assets to sell. We can sell part of
the joint ventures, or part of the shares. My
suggestion before was that they should even sell
100 percent of NLNG. I don’t think government
should be in any business of investing in sectors
like LNG.”
Mr. Dangote’s suggestion, backed by notable
figures like Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and
Governor of Central Bank, Godwin Emefiele, has
generated intense debates among Nigerians.
Mr. Falana told PREMIUM TIMES, Thursday, that
the suggestion was “in total conflict with section
16 of the (Nigerian) Constitution which has
prohibited the concentration of the nation’s
wealth in the hands of a few people or a group.
“Indeed, by virtue of section 44 of the
Constitution, the nation’s natural resources shall
be held in trust for the Nigerian people by the
federal government.”
Falana said that senators would have been
expected to kick against Dangote’s suggestion,
since they had sworn to protect the constitution.
“But for selfish considerations, a few legislators
who may be queuing up to participate in the
purchase of the nation’s assets are not prepared
to defend the Constitution.
“If the senate is genuinely desirous to contribute
meaningfully to the debate on the economy, it
should, as a matter of urgency, propose a
substantial reduction in the jumbo emoluments of
federal legislators which are said to be the highest
in the world.”
Falana said the country’s privatization
programme in the past was discovered to be a rip
off on the nation and the people, but that nothing
was done about it, despite a senate resolution,
under the leadership of the then senate
president, David Mark, that the government
should recover such assets.
President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration
could still implement the resolution of the senate
for the interest of the national economy, Mr.
Falana said.
The lawyer advised the government to also go for
the official quarters that he said were “illegally
sold” to the then Chief Justice of Nigeria, Katsina-
Alu, the then Senate President, Mr. Mark, and the
then Speaker, House of Representatives, Dimeji
Bankole.
“It is on record that whereas the federal
government had spent billions of Naira to
renovate the properties, each of them was
fraudulently sold for about N50 million,” Mr.
Falana said.
“Many other properties of the federal government
in Abuja, Lagos and other cities were undersold to
many public officers and their cronies. Apart from
the recovery of the NET building in Lagos which
was sold to the father of a legislator for N4 billon
instead of the market value of N75 billion, the sale
of the other 531 properties of Nitel and other
agencies of the federal government located in the
various parts of the country have not been
accounted for.”
Mr. Falana said, instead of selling the nation’s
remaining assets, the federal government could
liquidate “over N5 trillion” of toxic debts and also
recover huge funds that were given as bailouts to
banks and other private companies during the
eras of Sanusi Lamido and Chukwuma Soludo as
CBN governors.