SERAP describes ‘looters list’ as selective, urges Buhari to withdraw it

…APC says PDP getting paranoid over list
A group, Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), has asked the Presidency to withdraw the ‘looters list’ which was released over the weekend.

Reacting to the released list on Sunday, SERAP, described the list as selective and that it should be immediately withdrawn.

It wants the Presidency to come up with a comprehensive list of looters which should include members of all political parties in Nigeria even those in the ruling party.

This is as the National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, has said the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is beginning to experience paranoid since the release of looters list by the Federal Government.

The Presidency had on Friday released the list claiming that they were members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), but the opposition party had dismissed the selective list, and asked the Presidency to release list of convicted persons and not suspects.
It said some of the names in the list were not its members.

However, SERAP in a statement signed by its Director, Adetokunbo Mumuni, said the list was political and could diminish President Muhammadu Buhari’s fight against corruption.

The statement read: “The Federal Government should immediately withdraw the clumsy, arbitrary and selective looters’ list, released last week. The list would seem to serve a political objective or carry out political agenda.

“This kind of action can only diminish the government’s ability to fight corruption, allow suspected perpetrators, whether from the All Progressives Congress (APC) or the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to escape justice, and ultimately, deny victims of corruption justice and effective remedies.

The authorities should withdraw the looters’ list and come up with a comprehensive list.”

SERAP further claimed that allowing the published looters’ list to stand would signal to Nigerians that the administration of President Buhari was not serious to satisfactorily address the corruption allegations under the former President Goodluck Jonathan and involving those close to this government.

“This politicised list comes at a time when the government is promoting itself as a beacon of transparency and accountability, and a model for other African countries to follow.

“The authorities ought to have resisted the temptation to put out this shambolic list and instead obeyed the spirit and the letter of Justice Shagari;s judgment,” the statement added.

Recall that the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, had on Friday released a list of some of those who have allegedly looted the nation’s treasury. The names in the list revealed were mostly PDP chieftains who are being tried for corruption and financial crimes.

But, in its reaction, the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Mr. Kola Ologbondiyan, alleged that the list is the beginning of clamp down on the opposition.

According to Ologbondiyan, the release of the list is the first leg of “this scheme is to commence vicious intimidation and harassment of the PDP members who have refused to succumb to pressure to join the APC in its undemocratic quest to create room for a one party state in Nigeria.”

Reacting to Ologbondiyan’s comment, APC spokesman, Bolaji Abdullahi, said, “The PDP is getting paranoid. And this is quite understandable. Behavioural psychologists will tell you that paranoia is a possible symptom of a guilty conscience.”