Former Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amechi has taunted the immediate Managing Director of the Nigerian Port Authority, NPA, Hadiza Bala Usman, for peddling a false narrative in her book titled “Stepping on Stones”: my odyssey at the Nigerian port Authority, as a book full of lies. Hadiza has in that her book described how she overcomes adversaries to emerge as the managing Director of the NPA.
However, speaking during an annual lecture organised by the Niche with the theme: Why Stride and Slip; Leadership, Nationalism and the Nigerian condition, held in Lagos, Amechi said the former NPA boss failed to include in her book her atrocities that lead to her removal from office.
Although, Amechi is responding for the first time the claims laid in that book by his former subordinate.
In her book Hadiza alleged that the former Rivers state Governor was the man that was responsible for her removal from office in February, 2022 for her failure to bribe him with unlimited favours.
The former NPA boss was suspended from office in May, 2021 for her failure to remit N165bn operating surplus into the Consolidated Revenue Fund Account of the federation by the NPA.
Amechi revealed that he has been trying not to join issues with her concerning most of her claims as they were full of lies.
Amaechi further disclosed that she refused to say as managing Director of NPA she was entitle to only N2.5m approval limit, but she approved a contract of N2.4bn.
According to him, the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) found out that despite the lack of appropriation, the contract was inflated by N58m which she was asked to refund, that shocked her to bone marrow.
The former Transport minister maintained, “There is a huge debate in the past six months whether I should respond or not. I said I would respond today but 90 percent said I should not.
“The lies were too many. For instance, she claimed she was not invited by the panel. I even came with the memo of the president, where the president endorsed her removal.
“Count one is in the question of the fact that the panel says she is guilty; count two is due to the fact that a Managing Director of NPA with N2.5m approval limit can approve N2.8b contract with no appropriation…
He queried, “Why is that document not published because prominent Nigerians are involved. She gave waivers to prominent Nigerians, which she has no power to give and these are dollars accruable to Nigeria’s economy but she was bold to write a book or is it a pamphlet and Nigerians are following her, launching the book, so how will Nigeria move forward?
“But let’s wait until they bring the original copy because if I give you the photocopy, you will say it is fake. I will show you the original but I won’t allow you to read it because you would see the names of those prominent Nigerians that were indicted by the panel. I will rather read the areas that concern her and leave those prominent Nigerians; they didn’t look for my trouble.
“But to show you how bad the situation was for me as the Minister of Transport, the Federal Executive Council, FEC, the President and Vice President including the Minister of Transport will approve an agreement for Lekki Deep Sea Port, the MD of NPA will change it and when queried, she will say for national interest, so are we for Biafra interest?” he asked.
Amechi revealed that Nigeria is in dire need of leaders who have nationalist mindset that promote diversity, equality and all-inclusion government.
He laments that sadly, “I doubt that we had a national leader. The only person near the figure of nationalism is President Obasanjo. A national leader has the ability to galvanize the totality of a nation around the common national banner.
“Genuine nationality leadership transcends ethnicity, religion, region or geography. The truly remarkable leader is the one that rises above these limitations to take the nation to that place where they long for,”
Speaking earlier, the Managing Director of the Niche Ikechukwu Amaechi stated that the lecture was targeted at addressing issues affecting the country at large.
He concluded that “Nigeria is at the crossroads, no doubt. All the indices of human development are pointing south. Why are we thriving and sliding”.