Former member of the House of Representatives and anti-corruption crusader, Honourable Dino Melaye on Wednesday raised an alarm over what he tagged the unprecedented massive corruption in the national polity. Worried by the high rate of corruption in the country, concluding that “Nigeria is in perilous times; in times of opprobrium.”

 Speaking with newsmen in Ibadan, the former lawmaker asked Nigerian masses to shine their own eyes properly in 2014 by calling public office holders to accountability through closer monitoring of their day to day activities, to effectively checkmate the cankerworm ravaging the nation.

 While lamenting that the present Federal Government was engrossed in massive corruption, promotes corruption, and embraces corruption with impunity, Melaye said

“it is unfortunate that despite the fact that many ministers have been indicted in this government from the Minister of the Niger Delta to the Minister of Aviation to the Minister of Petroleum – it is unfortunate that the President does not have the capacity to probe these ministers.”

“The most recent is the Minister of Aviation who has been indicted by both the EFCC, the Presidential Committee set up by the President and even the House of Representatives.  But she failed, as a Minister, to resign and the President is yet to take any decision on her.  The Minister of Petroleum has been indicted by six different committees. 

"The first is the House of Representatives Committee on Subsidy headed by Farouk Lawan; the second is the Ribadu Report; the third is the Aig-Imoukuede Report – a committee set up by the Minister of Finance; the fourth is the NEITI Report; the fifth is the Senate Committee on Subsidy headed by Senator Bukola Saraki and the sixth is the KPMG Report on the Petroleum Sector," he said.

According to him, these six reports have indicted  NNPC, where the Minister of Petroleum is the Chairman of the Board; they have indicted the PPPRA where she is the supervising Minister; they have indicted the Ministry of Petroleum where she superintends as the Minister.

“But despite these indictments by six different committees, the Minister of Petroleum is still elegantly and fashionably attired as she junkets all about and also attending the Federal Executive Council meetings in the watchful eyes of unperturbed President.  It is quite unfortunate.

“We have a precedent and it is a public and national convention in this country that once a minister is indicted, that minister is suspended or removed from office," he added.

He recalled that when Sunday Afolabi was Minister of Internal Affairs during the Obasanjo’s first term, he was indicted in the National Identity Card scam, he was instantly removed as Minister and he eventually died in prison. 

"When Fabian Osuji was Minister of Education, he was indicted of corruption and was removed as Minister in Obasanjo’s second term as President. "Even recently, during the tenure of late President Umar Yar’Adua, of blessed memory, when the Minister of Health, Professor Adenike Grange and the Minister of State for Health, Gabriel Aduku were indicted of N10million, they were removed as ministers, even before the completion of investigations by the anti-graft agencies.