Mallam Nasir Ahmad El-rufai, the self proclaimed Mr. clean may not be squeaky clean after all, infers Mr. Charles Osuji, former deputy director of Bureau of public enterprise (BPE),who has admitted to collecting bribes on behalf of its former Director-General, Nasir el-Rufai.

Asked about the sale of Conoil, Mr. Osuji told the Senate that he received bribe from prominent businessman, Mike Adenuga,to manipulate the sale of Conoil in his favour.

Charles Osuji said he collected bribes from Adenuga to influence the price of the company in his favour. But a twist to the whole confession was when he said the bribes were received on behalf of the former Director General and former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Malam Nasir el-Rufai.

He admitted before the Senate ad-hoc Committee investigating the privatization of government businesses that the money was received in various hard currencies as Adenuga did not give him the bribe at once Saturday evening after he was summoned to testify on his role in the BPE. 

Osuji said he later had problems with el-Rufai because he refused to remit the bribe to him. According to him, “I told him about it because he was the one I received the bribe for but I refused to give it to him and that was how problems started between us till he sent me out of the BPE,” he said while asking the Senators to help reinstate him to his previous post.

Asked why he decided not to give his former boss the bribe, he said “because Adenuga was paying it small, small,” and this evoked serious laughter before the Senators reprimanded him and reminded him of the criminal implications of bribery in the country.

They further questioned his appeal for reinstatement because he had betrayed the rules.

However, the current director General of BPE ,Bolanle Onagoruwa, defended el-Rufai, saying that Osuji was sacked because of corruption. She said the management discovered that he was receiving bribes and thus was shown the way out since the el-Rufai she knows and worked with would not tolerate such acts.

There has been a lot of confessions since the panel began investigation into the commercialisation of the country’s businesses. Some of those who have testified have implicated former President Olusegun Obasanjo forcing human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, to call for the prosecution of the former President.

More revelations were made Saturday evening when a former Deputy Director of Bureau of Public Enterprises, BPE, ended up disgracing himself before the Senate after he told the confessing that he received bribe from prominent businessman, Mike Adenuga, while the latter moved to purchase Conoil.

Charles Osuji said he collected bribes from Adenuga to influence the price of the company in his favour. But a twist to the whole confession was when he said the bribes were received on behalf of the former Director General and former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Malam Nasir el-Rufai.

He admitted before the Senate ad-hoc Committee investigating the privatisation of government businesses that the money was received in various hard currencies as Adenuga did not give him the bribe at once Saturday evening after he was summoned to testify on his role in the BPE. 

Osuji said he later had problems with el-Rufai because he refused to remit the bribe to him. According to him, “I told him about it because he was the one I received the bribe for but I refused to give it to him and that was how problems started between us till he sent me out of the BPE,” he said while asking the Senators to help reinstate him to his previous post.

Asked why he decided not to give his former boss the bribe, he said “because Adenuga was paying it small, small,” and this evoked serious laughter before the Senators reprimanded him and reminded him of the criminal implications of bribery in the country.

They further questioned his appeal for reinstatement because he had betrayed the rules.

However, the current director General of BPE ,Bolanle Onagoruwa, defended el-Rufai, saying that Osuji was sacked because of corruption. She said the management discovered that he was receiving bribes and thus was shown the way out since the el-Rufai she knows and worked with would not tolerate such acts.

There has been a lot of confessions since the panel began investigation into the commercialisation of the country’s businesses. Some of those who have testified have implicated former President Olusegun Obasanjo forcing human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, to call for the prosecution of the former President.

Source: huhuonline.com