The leadership of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), has asked President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to order an investigation into the mismanagement of the moribund Ajaokuta Steel Company Ltd.
NANS President, Comrade Lucky Emonefe, who made the call in a statement on Monday in Abuja, said all those involved in the mismanagement of the company must be immediately brought to book.
The students, however, commended President Tinubu for the effort put so far into the development of the Ajaokuta Steel Company and National Iron Ore Mining Company, Itakpe, since he assumed office.
Emonefe said from history, apart from the late President Shehu Shagari era, this would be the first time that the steel company would have this kind of unusual support from the Federal Government.
According to the student body, the steel plant when completed and come alive would be a haven of massive employment opportunities for Nigerian Students upon graduation as well as being a technology site where potential engineering students all over the country could come and experience technological innovations at its peak as they aspire for greatness in the field of engineering.
Comrade Emonefe lamented in spite of huge funds committed to the projects in the past, Ajaokuta Steel Company and National Iron Ore Mining Company have remained inoperational, adding that now that there were ongoing plans to resuscitate the projects with the attraction of investors in topmost gear, there was the need to probe the management of the company over time.
He equally called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offenses Commission ICPC) to launch an investigation into the management of the steel company.
The NANS President who also called for decentralization of power in the steel company, observed that having a Sole Administrator for the past 12 years to oversee a public and national company like Ajaokuta Steel was not good enough.
He added that the practice has given room to corruption in the sense that there would be no one else to check the excesses of the Sole Administrator.
He said: “The government and the stakeholders alike are working assiduously to see that the company comes back to life. This is a good omen for the Renewed Hope Agenda to continue to flourish amidst the global economic crisis that has engulfed the world right about now.
“It is also worthy of note that the set of individuals who brought the Ajaokuta Steel Company to this comatose are still walking the street uninvestigated and unpunished.
“These people who have been indicted to the tune of several millions of US dollars further siphoned $496m in September 2022 through Buhari’s administration, have neither been probed nor punished.
“This is not a good precedence at all and if unchecked would create an avenue for dabbling into President Tinubu’s efforts at resuscitating the steel plant.
“These individuals including past corrupt government executives denied the public, most especially the youth, the benefit of experiencing the exodus of job opportunities, technological exposure and economic emancipation that would have been massively accrued to us all these while if they had done what was expected of them.
“They selfishly and callously mismanaged Ajaokuta Steel Company and grounded it with the notion that nothing will happen in the end. If acts like these go uninvestigated and unpunished, what is now the tendency that after rebuilding, some other people would not come and do the same thing to loot and ground it again the umpteenth time? This should not be.
“If there are individuals or groups of individuals protecting the corrupt managers of the Ajaokuta Steel Company and hereby shielding them from any form of probe and judgement, it simply means that they are beneficiaries of the ill-gotten proceeds of the mismanagement or they have other personal interests that are not people-friendly and that is tantamount to water down or nullify President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s fight against corruption.
“These set of people should also be probed. They may even be part of those used by these selfish leaders to loot the treasury of the steel company dry.
“The Nigerian Students are not the type to back down on fights of this peculiarity, especially one that is against the tenets of financial accountability and transparency.
“Hence, we implore the EFCC, ICPC and other related agencies to stand their ground against every form of intimidation or shielding, as they probe and investigate these heartless people.
