ALBNI on Friday in a statement signed by its Executive Director, Remi Adebayo, said that a memo EC (2023) 127 Ratification of the President's Anticipatory Approval for the Implementation of the Nigeria Customs Modernisation Project was passed on Wednesday at the FEC meeting presided over by the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo.
An accountability group, the Accountable Leadership for Better Nigeria Initiative (ALBNI), has demanded that President Muhammadu Buhari reverses the implementation of the Nigeria Customs Modernisation Project - E-Customs approved by the Federal Executive Council (FEC).
ALBNI on Friday in a statement signed by its Executive Director, Remi Adebayo, said that a memo EC (2023) 127 Ratification of the President's Anticipatory Approval for the Implementation of the Nigeria Customs Modernisation Project was passed on Wednesday at the FEC meeting presided over by the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo.
According to the group, the government officials who presided over the drafting of the "offensive" memo and rammed the same through FEC approval have done a great disservice.
Adebayo stated that "President Buhari has an opportunity for true repentance by rejecting the final ratification of memo EC (2023) 127 Ratification of the President's Anticipatory Approval for the Implementation of the Nigeria Customs Modernisation Project.
"The memo was passed last Wednesday at the Federal Executive Council, FEC, meeting where Vice President Yemi Osinbajo presided.
"The government officials who presided over the drafting of the 'offensive' memo and rammed the same through FEC approval have done a great disservice to the legacy of President Buhari. History will bear witness, sooner than later.
"The Accountable Leadership for Better Nigeria Initiative calls on President Buhari and the Federal Government to immediately reverse the controversial re-approval of the concession agreement on Nigeria Customs Service Modernisation Project, also called the E-Customs Project.
"President Buhari must jettison the extracts of the odious memo to be presented on Wednesday, 26 April at the FEC meeting! With a subsisting legal dispute and a valid court order in the aftermath of the first concession to Messrs E. Customs HC Project Limited on September 2, 2020 by the Federal Executive Council, any new approval as proposed by the Minister of Finance, amounts to impunity and approving lawlessness on the part of the government.
"ALBNI finds it curious that the Minister of State, Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mr Clem Agba while addressing the press last Wednesday, feigned ignorance of a pending court order on the matter."
The group noted that Messrs Dipo Okpeseyi Ahmed Raji, both Senior Advocates of Nigeria, had in separate letters, warned the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister for Justice; the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning and Secretary to the Government of the Federation of “underhand efforts being made to obtain FEC's approval and or ratification of the re-award of the e-Customs Modernisation Project.”
According to ALBNI, a Federal High Court in Abuja had last year restrained the Nigerian Government from enforcing or giving effect to an agreement on the Customs Modernisation Project and it is on the weight of this matter that the lawyers urged FEC to suspend, discontinue or discountenance any request to initiate deliberations or a fresh request for approval for the award of the said contract to any other bidder aside the original approval granted by FEC to Messrs E- Customs Project Limited.
"They then harped on the need for the government to obey the order of the court in a suit FHC/ABJ/CS/848/2022 filed by the original concessionaire, Messrs E-Customs HC Project.
"On 20 February 2023, Justice Inyang Ekwo asked all parties to preserve the rest of the matter and do nothing to interfere with the proceedings.
"The case was last Wednesday adjourned to 8 June, 2023, for a definite hearing. It is on record that Messrs E-customs HC Project Limited and Bionica Technologies (West Africa) Limited have jointly challenged the alleged unlawful and fraudulent replacement of their names in the concession agreement earlier approved by President Buhari and ratified by FEC on 2 September, 2020.
"The firm had raised the alarm of “a sinister plot” to scheme it out as the approved concessionaire and replace it will an entity registered at the Corporate Affairs Commission on 5 April, 2022 with one Zainab Jummai Umar –Ajijola as one of its directors and shareholders."
Adebayo further explained that Justice Ekwo, while ruling on the ex-parte application, had granted the prayers of the plaintiffs having placed sufficient evidence of interest in the concession project.
He stated that defendants in the suit were the Nigerian Government; Attorney-General of the Federation; Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning; the Infrastructure Regulatory Concession Commission; Nigeria Customs Service; Trade Modernization Project Limited; Huawei Technologies Limited; Africa Finance Corporation and Bergman Security Consultant and Supplies Limited being 1st to 9th defendants respectively.
"We call on the Federal Government in the interest of justice and fairness, to reverse the approval and await the outcome of the pending case before the court.
"This will serve to position the outgoing Government as law abiding while guaranteeing that a lawful decision is taken on the project without grossly violating Section 2 of the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission Act 2005.
"That is the only path of honour to avoid erecting legal landmines for the in-coming administration and stop making Nigeria a laughing stock among international investors."