In what has turned out to be a controversial autobiography, the Awujale of Ijebu Land, Oba Sikiru Adetona, tells the story of the witch hunt of Mike Adenuga, one of Nigeria’s foremost businessmen, by former President Olusegun Obasanjo through the instrument of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

The year was 2006, the month was July and the day was the 9th.

On that day, the Awujale records: “The EFCC in Lagos had come calling brusquely on Mike Adenuga (Jnr), Chairman Globacom. They broke his gate, swarmed into his house and kept him under ‘arrest’. The EFCC purportedly were on the trail of some money belonging to the Petroleum Trust Development Fund (PTDF), but there was really more beneath the veneer.”

An independent investigation by Punch conducted in July 2006 sheds more light on the arrest. 70 riot policemen assisted EFCC operatives with the arrest of Mike Adenuga at his mansion that day, and the arrest was effected inspite of a sudden power outage at the mansion. In fact, the EFCC had been on the trail of Adenuga before his eventual arrest at his home and detention at the EFCC annex at 7 Okotie Eboh street, Ikoyi.

In his autobiography, the Awujale writes that the allegations against Mike Adenuga by the EFCC were as follows:

a. “That Abubakar Atiku, the Vice-President, gave Mike Adenuga money from the Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) which were invested in Mike’s bank, Equatorial Trust Bank (ETB), and that the funds were used in paying for the Globacom licence.

b. That as a result of the connection in (a) Atiku was a major shareholder in Globacom. And Atiku used his clout to ensure that PTDF money got into ETB.

c. That General Ibrahim Babangida, the former Head of State, was also a major shareholder in Globacom.”

After Mike Adenuga’s arrest and release, Mohammed Babangida was also arrested. Adenuga saw the handwriting on the wall and proceeded on self-exile to the UK.

According to the Awujale, Mike Adenuga was simply a means to an end. He was being used by Obasanjo to get Atiku Abubakar’s head on a stick. But why? Something about a third term agenda that failed and Adenuga’s closeness to Atiku.

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has however lashed out at the Awujale for telling “a tissue of lies and untruths.” He stated in a letter to the Awujale that “under my watch, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, was free to do its job as it saw fit. On several occasions, Nuhu Ribadu has asserted that, under my watch, he was a free agent to do his work as he deemed fit. On no occasion did I guide, lead or direct him on what to do.”

In spite of the former President’s rebuttal to the account as told by the Awujale, other accounts give credence to the Awujale’s story that Obasanjo went after Mike Adenuga in other to get at his Vice President, whom he had fallen out with.

One of those accounts is an opinion piece written by Louis Odion in Sunday Sun circa 2006. In that op-ed, Louis Odion stated thus: “Indeed, from the constellation of information now put in the public domain, Adenuga’s “sins” can be reduced to a four-count charge: that the PTDF placed deposits in Equitorial Trust Bank owned by Adenuga; that public funds were converted to augment the payment for the GSM license of Globacom in 2002; that he donated a building to ABTI University owned by the Vice President (Atiku Abubakar) apparently as “gratification” for his influencing the lodgement of PTDF money in ETB; that the Vice President owned a stake in Globacom.

The last charge would seem to have been informed by the fact that the Vice President presided over the FEC meeting that approved the GSM license for Globacom while the president was on official trip abroad. The inference to be drawn here, therefore, is that, left to the president, Globacom would not have secured the license.”

Mr. Odion went ahead to argue that the EFCC had no reason to go after Adenuga because in the first place there is documentation that Globacom paid for its licence in 2002, while the PTDF money was lodged in his bank in 2003. Further more, the Globacom licence was paid by a loan facility obtained from BNP Paribas. Secondly, it was no secret that “in the pre-consolidation era, banks in Nigeria mostly specialised in jostling for public sector funds to bolster their liquidity. So, how could it now amount to a crime for ETB to have been favored to bank PTDF money?” Lastly, there was no issue to be made out of Adenuga’s donation to Atiku’s University (ABTI University), as it was well documented at the time of writing that “Adenuga had donated generously to causes involving the president (including the Presidential Library in Abeokuta).”

Mr. Odion concludes by saying that apparently, Adenuga’s woes were brought on because the powers of the day were displeased with him for refusing to “squeal information on Atiku’s alleged shady deals- information that Obasanjo needed in his desperation to nail his deputy after they fell out. In other words, Obasanjo never met a grudge he didn’t keep.