The Save Nigeria Group has asked the Federal Government to sack the Central Bank Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, over the N100m gift he gave to the victims of Boko Haram
attacks in Kano State.
Also, the youth wing of the Christian Association of Nigeria has disagreed with the explanation given by the CBN on the donation by the apex bank governor, saying he should be sacked.
The SNG said the CBN governor desecrated his office and violated the laws of the land by manifesting ethnic and religious bias in the discharge of his duties.
It threatened to mobilise Nigerians to the streets if the government failed to sack Sanusi.
Addressing a news conference in Abuja on Thursday, the SNG National Coordinator, Benedict Ezeagu, stated that Sanusi’s actions and utterances portrayed him as “an undisciplined politician instead of a public servant engaging in dangerous brinkmanship and taking advantage of Nigeria’s fault lines and the impunity permeating the public service.”
He said that Sanusi’s donation of money that was not appropriated by the National Assembly was “illegal, provocative, divisive and a display of clannish and ethnic bias.”
Ezeagu, who is also the Coordinator, Lawyers of Conscience, explained that the 1999 Constitution did not authorise the CBN governor to personally give out public fund.
He described the donation as an usurpation of the statutory function of the National Emergency Management Agency.
The SNG activist took Sanusi to task over his statement that the Boko Haram insurgency was caused by the 13 per cent derivation formula, describing this as reckless and a questionable justification of the sect’s activities.
Ezeagu said, “The most provocative of his (Sanusi) actions is his recent questionable diversion of a whopping N100m from the CBN as a donation to the government of his state of origin, Kano, for the victims of the Boko Haram insurgence without the necessary appropriation by the National Assembly and without authorisation from the board of CBN or the President/Federal Executive Council.
“Apart from the illegality of his action, the donation stands out today as the pinnacle of ethnic bias and sectarian favouritism considering the fact that before the Kano incident, there had been civil unrest, bombings and fatalities in Abuja, Plateau, Borno, Yobe, Niger, Adamawa, Nasarawa and Oyo states.”
The SNG accused the CBN governor of illegally donating N500m without appropriation to the University of Benin.
A board member of the CBN, Prof. Sam Olofin, had defended Sanusi’s action, saying the gesture was within the purview of the corporate social responsibility and mandate of the apex bank.
He had said that the donation was not made because Sanusi was from Kano State, but that the huge damage caused by the bomb blasts prompted the apex bank to make the donation.
Quoting from the CBN Act, he had said, “The Act in functions of management said that the governor, or in his absence, the deputy governor nominated by him shall be in charge of the day-to-day management of the bank and shall be accountable to the board for his acts and decisions.
“So, there is no single action that the governor takes to which he is not accountable to the board or does not entail clearance from the board.”
The Public Relations Officer of YOWICAN, Pastor John Pofi, in a statement obtained by our correspondent on Thursday in Abuja, condemned the donation by the CBN to the Kano victims of Boko Haram and called for the immediate sacking of Sanusi.
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