Emir of Kano, Sanusi, wants treasury looters punished

The Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, has reiterated call for government to punish looters of public funds.

He made this known at the National Defence College in Abuja, yesterday, while delivering a lecture on ‘Deregulation of the Downstream Oil Sector and Nigeria’s Economic Development’.

The lecture was part of activities marking the graduation of the 2016 NDC Course 24 participants.

The Emir also faulted the subsidy regime, describing it as unfair to the masses. “The whole issue of fuel subsidy was set up to create opportunity for a few people to make money, yet it was presented in a manner that convinced everybody it was for the poor,” he said.

He added: “We got to a point when, even though the numbers were starring us in the face, the entire nation was in denial. In 2009, when I became Governor of the Central Bank, the Nigerian government spent N291 billion that year subsidising petroleum products. Two years later in 2011, N213 trillion was spent on the same subsidy. So, has our population increased tenfold? It was very clear that this wasn’t oil subsidy; it was a scam.

“This is how bad non-deregulation was because it allowed a small group of criminals to garner so much financial resources as to undermine every single institution that we had for checks and balances.”

The Guardian