BUHARI TO GET FUNDS FROM ARAB DONORS • It’s not true, says aide Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Gen, Muhammadu Buhari, will soon receive some millions of dollars in funding from Arab billionaires who had assisted in funding his 2003, 2007 and 2011 campaigns. It was gathered that former Oil Minister from Saudi Arabia, Ahmed Zaki Yamani, and some other Arab billionaires used a secret funding route to channel millions of dollars to Buhari’s campaign. Information pieced together further revealed that the funds doled out between 2003 and 2011, helped build a vast network of think tanks, supporters and groups working for a single purpose: To make Buhari President of Nigeria. It was also revealed that over the past decade some anonymous donors gave several hundreds of thousands in foreign currencies to bankroll the presidential bid of Gen. Buhari which flowed to the campaign through his trusted loyalist, who is embedded in the party. A source in the know told our correspondent on condition of anonymity that the entire donation was done with a guarantee of complete secrecy for the donors who wish to remain hidden. This was just as the former Saudi Arabia Minister for Petroleum and Mineral Resources, and another powerful Saudis were behind mobilisation of the funds with the intention to bankroll a movement to install an Islamic leader as head of government in Africa’s largest economy. According to Professor Roberts, of the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, the donor’s main objective is the ascent of political Islam, which has been a crucial factor in the swelling and deepening ‘Islamisation’ of many Arab and non-Arab societies within the past three decades. From Casablanca, Algiers, Adamawa, Cairo, Kano, Kebbi, Khartoum, Damascus, Baghdad, Istanbul, Tehran, Jakarta, to Islamabad, the donors have provided huge funds to execute the agenda, typically moving from preaching and proselytizing to building mosques, schools and economic infrastructure, in many cases crisscrossing different countries. “The swelling of political Islam cascaded over how vast segments of the northern youths in Nigerian societies identified themselves – not abruptly moving from the traditional national distinctiveness to broader Islamic identities, but merging the national with the Islamic. “The characterizations neither conformed to a specific set of values nor converged round a unique and distinct body of morals,” he said. According to him, “the overarching objective of almost all donor political Islamic groups is not only to attain parliamentary majorities or control presidencies, but to gradually Islamise their states – and their societies.” Yamani became a close friend of Buhari in 1977 when the former leader was Federal Commissioner (position now called minister) for Petroleum and Natural Resources. Contrary to the make belief that Buhari is poor, more questions have been raised on how he was able to raise the financial chest to fund three presidential campaigns within a decade. In 2011 when the merger between Congress for Progressive Change, CPC and Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN broke down, it was believed that initial funds from the Arab donors ensured that Buhari continued to run his campaign in Northern Nigeria with ease, despite his perceived austere posture. As a political analyst based in Abuja, Malik Ibrahim puts it: “The funding of the Buhari campaign is becoming increasingly invisible to public scrutiny but constantly growing. The Buhari campaign team is increasingly getting money from sources that are anonymous or untraceable. There is no transparency, no accountability for the money. There is no way to tell who is funding them.” In July 1982, Yamani founded Investcorp, private equity firm, with several other oil ministers and well-known financiers. The firm’s initial investments included Tiffany & Co, Breguet, a Swiss watch maker, Yamani, himself known to be a watch lover. It’s not true – Buhari’s aide Reacting to the allegation of Arab donors’ support for the APC, Gen. Buhari’s Campaign Organisation spokesman, Dr. Chidia Maduekwe, said there was no truth in the matter. He said the media had been awash with similar stories, but there is nothing in it. Maduekwe said: “There is no truth in the story. By Wednesday (tomorrow), we will do our press conference to tell the whole world how much we have realised. Our source of funding is from the masses. We even collect as little as N100 and during the fundraising, governors will do what they need to do. “If it is on account of money, you know Buhari would not have beaten others. What is driving this project is what I call Peoples Power Possibility; the pulse of the masses is what is driving this wind of change. If it is for money, we cannot fight the PDP. So, we depend on the masses,” he said. Source: Nigerian Pilot
Posted on: Wed, 07 Jan 2015 21:53:21 +0000
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