US Group Warns Against Voting Atiku, Says He Will Enrich Self, Cronies If He Wins
Lekan Paul
Posted On Jan 10, 2019
An America political risk consultancy firm, Eurasia Group has issued a clear warning to Nigerian voters against voting the opposition Peoples Democratic arty (PDP) presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
According to the group, Atiku poses to enriching himself and his cronies if he wins the presidential elections holding on February 16.
He (Atiku) is “gerontocrat who would focus on enriching himself and his cronies, avoiding the difficult and politically unpopular tasks necessary for reform,” Eurasia Group said in the report published on December 7.
The group added that Atiku “also pose the risk of a return to an even more rent-seeking governing style.”
Alhaji Abubakar is considered by critics as a corrupt figure, a perception that dates from his time in Obasanjo’s administration when he allegedly accumulated significant holdings in oil and banking enterprises and built a sizeable real estate portfolio.
He and his fourth wife Jennifer Douglas, an American citizen, were allegedly indicted in 2010 in a 328-page American Senate committee report for transferring over $40 million “suspect funds” to America from offshore accounts between 2002 and 2008.
“Ms Douglas helped her husband bring over $40 million in suspect funds into the United States, including at least $1.7 million in bribe payments from Siemens AG, a German corporation, and over $38 million from little known offshore corporations, primarily LetsGo Ltd. Inc., Guernsey Trust Company Nigeria Ltd., and Sima Holding Ltd,” the Carl Levin-led Permanent Subcommittee on Investigation said on page 173 of its report.
Although Abubakar has not visited the United States since he was indicted, he has maintained that he did nothing wrong.
