Letter to Keyamo #3-Clarity of Conviction

Dear Mr Keyamo,

I note that you have said your latest public letter to me is going to be your last over the issues we are discussing, since you would like to move on to concentrate on "other more pressing matters". In that regard, you presented your intention as "to sum up the white, black and gray areas that have emerged from our various correspondence". My understanding of that intention is that you feel it necessary to clarify a few things after reading my response. Well, I have now read your latest response fully and also feel I need to make some clarifications of my own as well.

(1) On the true extent of relationship, the fact that you met me before you left Gani Fawehinmi's Chambers (whether in 1994 or 1995) should not be considered in isolation. It should be considered along with your corresponding claims of further contacts and the nature of discussions you claim we had. The impression you are creating, which you have not denied, is that we have known each other as friends and confidantes for fifteen years and that this explains why I supposedly visited your office on those occasions you mentioned before travelling out of Nigeria and then visited you again on return.

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Thus, at this point of our exchange, the first and biggest challenge you face is to tell the truth about my person as much as you know me. Did I visit your office in Maryland to intimate you about my medical problems or travel plans before I finally left in 1999? Did I visit you at any point in time thereafter on my return to Nigeria? Have I met you in person much more than the two times I mentioned? If the answer to these questions is in the negative, as I expect, simply say so, apologize and let's move on from that point. Please, note that I do not wish to score any point with such clarifications. As I said in my first response to you, I have no problem describing you as a friend; what I have problems with is the fact that you had to concoct lies to show the extent of our friendship.

(2) You seem to still be confusing the purpose of my original writing to you. You keep talking about me not providing enough evidence for you to go to court and so on. The point is that there are two aspects of your public work. One is professionally as a lawyer and the other is as a political activist. I have never questioned your work as a lawyer nor your choice of clientele, but the point is if your job as a lawyer seems to be infringing upon your commitment as a political activist and public conscience (which is the aspect of you me and most Nigerians are interested in) then I think it's fair for me or anyone else who feels that way to raise the matter with you. I didn't do so because I wanted to show you up as a fraud. I did so to urge you to stand firm and to ask you to declare your stance publicly. But your response almost confirmed my fears. Your less than astute defence of Farida Waziri and Michael Aondoakaa is troubling, to say the least. For the record, I did not send you documentary evidence or any material relating to any case to go to court. I am not a lawyer and therefore cannot be in a position to know what is required for a case to have a reasonable chance of success in a court of law. I am an activist and a citizen-journalist who works in the alternative media. In the course of my work, I come across stories and documents that are enough to put activists and public consciences everywhere on inquiry. If you consider yourself one, as you do and as Nigerians have acknowledged, it behoves you to use these materials to act in that specific regard – not as a lawyer, but as an activist and public conscience. In practical terms, it means, with the Waziri and Aondoakaa stories and related documents for instance, what one would expect from you is an opinion – not one couched in obfuscating legal limitations, but one that directly addresses the worries of your civil society constituency, much like you did with Nuhu Ribadu over the sale of Russell Centre. For instance, calling for a probe of the issue, rather than keeping quiet or claiming you have nothing to go to court with would have sufficed. It wouldn't mean you are accusing anybody of anything; you would only be saying that all the facts must be made public for us to judge exactly what happened. You can always do this based on the little leads you've got. Frankly, I just feel you can do better than to be caught defending them with the most disingenuous of arguments.

(3) In my last response to you, I gave you a list of ten issues from a non-exhaustive list of documents and corrupt actions by Farida Waziri and Michael Aondoakaa. Of all, you now claim to have taken up just one, which is our report of the questionable withdrawals by Mrs. Farida Waziri. Below is how you presented your defence of Waziri over that one issue:

"But to highlight my point, I took up one of your allegations regarding withdrawal of monies from the EFCC account. My inquiries indicate that the dates and amounts you mentioned are not only false, but they are concocted beyond the acceptable limits of imagination. However, you may be innocent regarding this. Your source(s) may be one of those who thought Ribadu would be a life EFCC Chairman and may have fed you with total crap in a bid to pull down the present leadership of Waziri at all cost. Now, the embarrassing position you may find yourself over this now is the legal position that he who alleges must prove. You cannot insist I should make available to you the true figures and dates of my findings. It is you who alleged the original figures and dates that must provide evidence. This, you have failed to do". I would have found the above defence truly amusing if the consequences aren't tragic. You make yourself judge and jury over the dates and amounts we presented and without presenting the supposed true dates and amounts (which you must have supposedly discovered now in your inquiry) you've gone on to accuse us of falsehood and concoction "beyond the acceptable limits of imagination"! Now, the question is why are you leaving the supposed true dates and amounts still to our imagination? Shouldn't you be jumping at the opportunity to let Nigerians know what the true facts are from your inquiry? Why aren't you presenting the facts of your discovery? Why are you jumping ahead to say I cannot insist you make available the true figures and dates of your findings, because he who alleges must prove when in this particular case you are the one alleging? Yes, Mr. Keyamo, it is not as difficult and convoluted as you are making out. At this point, what is known is that we have published the dates and figures and of these we are sure. The fact is there is only one set of dates and figures out there still and we provided it. You cannot just sit there and be saying the dates and figures we provided "are not only false, but they are concocted beyond the acceptable limits of imagination" if you are not showing how this is so. It is terrible logic to expect that we who have provided clear dates and figures need now to go back to prove that you who provided no dates and figures at all are wrong! The point is we trust the information we have provided Nigerians. You have given Nigerians nothing to work with except throw out accusations of falsehoods and concoctions, which you have not backed up in anyway, despite your claim to have made inquiries! Mr. Keyamo, there is only one thing open to you and your client, Mrs. Waziri. If you're sure our dates, figures and general information are false, you should publish publicly what the true dates and figures are, showing why whatever we have claimed isn't the true; but do not forget that whatever you claim will have to be open to independent third party scrutiny. Anything short of this would make nonsense   of the defence you have made after supposedly investigating our claims.
(4) I see that you are making repetitive assertions about "renowned activists" or "senior activists" taking up jobs or consultancies with the EFCC under Ribadu as a way of justifying your work with the Commission today. This is something you mentioned in your first response to me and I notice also that you mentioned this severally in your so-called interview with the Street Journal, which we have published on our site as well (I say "so-called interview", because  it  seem to be riddled with  cut and paste versions of your original response to me and how that can be possible in a proper interview beats my imagination). You've made it a point to mention it again in your last response to me. Now, apart from the fact that you have not mentioned a single name of these supposed activists who were consultants to Ribadu's EFCC up till now, I need to point out to you that I have not said it is a crime to work for the EFCC or the government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, even under an Umaru Yar'Adua with a questionable mandate. What is in issue is how you do your work under any dispensation. Do you do your work beholden to persons who have appointed you or who are paying you with public funds (as we were often accusing Ribadu in his relationship with Obasanjo) or are you doing it only beholden to the Nigerian people who are the true sovereigns and your real employers? Thus, you need not justify your work today with the EFCC with the claim (true or not) that some other activists worked for Ribadu's EFCC. The job of prosecuting corrupt persons necessarily requires good lawyers. So, if the EFCC finds you worthy of the position, I can only pray that you understand that it is Nigerians who have appointed you there and it is only to them you owe loyalty, not to Waziri, Aondoakaa or Yar'Adua.

(5) I do not begrudge you your evidently pro-Waziri stance today, but you need to stop trying to make out that Sowore and SaharaReporters are unabashed supporters of Nuhu Ribadu. We are no proxies to anybody; we are only committed to the truth and Nigerians and our work can bear us out. I have explained this in enough detail to you in my first response. The fact that you still keep on saying or inferring it in your last response to me indicates to me that you are heavily invested in that notion for some unknown reason. We don't go out looking for information on Waziri because we are disappointed that Ribadu was not kept on as EFCC Chairman for life nor did we report on the December 10, 2008 EFCC affair in Abuja with a view to undermining what you now tout as its success. Frankly, at this stage, I am more interested in your claim now that you have "petitions concerning nothing less than ten (10) SERVING GOVERNORS and public officers". Let's hope you have enough evidence to act on these ones. Of course, from your "interview", I note with amusement your Ribadu-like excuses that the judiciary is the problem; but, again, let's hope you have better ways to prosecute and get results, including with the establishment of your "special courts" and appointment of "special judges" to hear the EFCC cases.

Finally, to end this, I must be honest with you. If the kind of defences you're now coming up with are what we are to expect, I would advise you to concentrate on your job with Mrs. Waziri and the EFCC, Yes, leave out the activism for now because nothing in your excuses or defences now indicates that you understand what is at stake for those of us still on this side of the divide. You may have fancied yourself as some kind of bridge between the activists and policy makers; but at this rate, it's going to be extremely difficult, because, for me, having read your latest response, I am beginning to think that the activist part of you has been unfairly subsumed under your present engagement with certain persons within the EFCC and the government.  I'm just being honest with my observation. And please, do not read into my observation anything to indicate that I'm accusing you, directly or indirectly, of being bought over. In your position, you do not have to be bought over to support Waziri or Aondoakaa. It may just be a case of you not yet finding the proper balance between both jobs and a better way to satisfy expectations of both constituencies. Whether my observation is true or false is left for time to prove. But if I were you, I wouldn't bother too much with what Sowore thinks. The point is you say you're doing this job freely for the EFCC; so exercising more independence in thought and action would be welcome. Again, don't hold out yourself as a defender of Waziri and Aondoakaa, certainly not with the kind of defences you've offered so far in our exchange.

Thank you.
Yours sincerely,
Omoyele Sowore

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