Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello, daughter of the immediate past Nigerian president, has often been in the news for the wrong reasons. The current N3.5 billion contract scam involving her and Austrian firm Schneider GMBH is typical.

Obasanjo-Bello, now a senator, is also a former commissioner of health in Ogun State. To many, it might seem she acquired her penchant for corrupt tendencies from her father.

Even her marriage crashed because of greed and impatience. She had been married to a Yoruba man who is a trained lawyer presently in the United States of America, with whom she has two boys.

A competent source revealed that soon after the emergence of her father as the president of Nigeria in 1999, Obasanjo-Bello seemed to have grown wings, so much so that her husband could no longer contain her. The situation led to the early termination of the marriage. She was said to have even sued her husband, claiming damages and consequently securing a change of name in court, using her father’s influence.
LEADERSHIP WEEKEND also gathered that Senator Obasanjo-Bello was among the beneficiaries of some illegal land allocations in the Federal Capital Territory under former minister Mallam Nasir el-Rufai. The former FCT minister had revoked a plot of land belonging to the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) transfer station in the Asokoro district of Abuja and re-allocated same to Obasanjo-Bello, el-Rufai’s two wives and others. The present minister of the FCT, Dr. Aliyu Moddibo, has since received the report of the probe panel he had earlier set up to probe the allocation and made the findings of the panel available to President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua for further action.

In the Senate, Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello almost stripped one of her personal aides naked in the lobby of the National Assembly over what she described as the irresponsible attitude of the aide. An eyewitness told LEADERSHIP WEEKEND that the senator manhandled her aide for leaving her mobile phones at home. Attempts by the aide to explain his action fell on deaf ears, as the senator threw all caution to the wind. It was in this same way that she harassed a security man at the back entrance to the White House of the National Assembly Complex.

What was the offence of the poor security man? He insisted that Senator Iyabo-Obasanjo submit her handbag for security checks, without knowing that she was a senator. But rather than identify herself, the senator, who represents Ogun Central senatorial district in Ogun State, took law into her hands.

The mother of all scandals involving Obasanjo-Bello is still developing: the N3.5 billion contracts in the power sector. The matter is already before the International Court of Arbitration in faraway Paris, France, where her business partner, M. Schneider, an Austrian company, has petitioned President Yar’Adua and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over what it described as the "fraudulent, corrupt and criminal nature involving Senator Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello (alias Mrs Damilola Akinlawon), then serving as a commissioner with the Ogun State government".

In the petition dated August 30, 2007, the petitioner , the Austrian company, alleged that Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello fraudulently presented herself as Mrs. Damilola Akinlawon while entering into the contract agreement with it to float a company which put in bids for contracts in the power projects embarked upon by the government headed by her father. Also copied in the petition were the chairmen of the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Miscellaneous Offences Commission (ICPC), the Senate Committee on Ethics as well as the Code of Conduct Bureau.

The former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, father of the accused, was not left out in the petition, as the Austrian firm alleged that the concealing of identity was aimed at shielding Obasanjo, who had obviously breached the relevant laws by awarding the power projects to his daughter.

To the foreign firm, the basis for the petition was for the anti-graft commission to ascertain whether Nigerian laws were broken by the senator, or she was acting on behalf of her father.

It was also revealed that the series of letters exchanged by both parties were packaged by an acquaintance of the Obasanjo family, Prince Albert Awofisayo, who also doubles as the chairman of Vamed Engineering Limited, which secured contracts to refurbish 17 teaching hospitals in Nigeria at the sum of N27 billion.

Some socio-political groups all over the country have continued to express their dissatisfaction over the shoddy deal involving the first daughter of the former president. The Austrian firm has shown evidence of the involvement of Obasanjo-Bello; as seen in the document tendered by M. Schneider, Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello stayed in the hotel between December 14 and 18 2005, while Awofisan stayed in the hotel between December 12 and 18, 2005.

In a sharp reaction, the Afenifere, a pan-Yoruba socio-political group, has demanded for the immediate probe of the N3.5 billion contract involving Obasanjo-Bello.

Afenifere, in a statement signed by its national publicity secretary, Yinka Odumakin, recalled that "there have been calls for Obasanjo’s probe in the last six months, which have been largely ignored. If Obasanjo still enjoys immunity and cannot be brought to book for the various allegations brought against him, we do not think that Iyabo has the same status. So we call on the EFCC to immediately apprehend her and carry out a thorough investigation, and if she is found to have committed this heinous crime, she should be charged to court immediately and be made to vacate her seat at the National Assembly."

The Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP), through its publicity secretary Osita Okechukwu, has equally called for the probe of Obasanjo-Bello.

It was also gathered that greed on the part Obasanjo-Bello caused a sharp disagreement with her business partner, which landed them in court and the contract was cancelled.

Akiya Nigeria Limited was also given 10 per cent equity in the company at incorporation, and was also expected to collect another 10 per cent commission on any contract secured for the company.
LEADERSHIP WEEKEND gathered from the Corporate Affairs Commission that it listed Dr. Iyabo Obasanjo of 101, Oduduwa Crescent, GRA, Ikeja, as a consultant. Busola Obasanjo, a business woman with the same address as Iyabo’s , is also a director of Akiya Nigeria Limited .

The company provided several documents to prove that the woman who signed agreements with it, purporting to be Mrs Akinlawon, was actually Senator Obasanjo-Bello. This includes an application by Otunba Awofisan to the Austrian Embassy in Nigeria for Schengen visa for Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello and Busola Obasanjo to secure the contract in December 2005.

The company also provided records of Renaissance Penta Vienna Hotel with the names of Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello and Mr. Richard Awofisayo as evidence that the person who signed the contract papers with them was actually Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello and not Damilola Akinlawon.

Correspondence was a guarantee that the company would secure the power project contracts with her father as president.

Awofisayo, it was gathered, entered into an agreement with the company to set up a Nigerian company named M. Schneider Energy Nigeria Limited as a special purpose company to secure power project contracts in Nigeria.

The Action Congress (AC) has also expressed shock at the emerging revelations surrounding the N3.5b controversy and called for a massive probe of that and other related contracts.

Specifically, the party said Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello’s role in the huge N27b contract awarded to Vamed Engineering Ltd., of which Awofisayo is chairman, to refurbish 17 teaching hospitals in the country should be investigated.

‘‘This is because there is a clear link between that N27 billion contract and the N3.5 billion power contract which M. Schneider and Co later obtained from the federal government,’’ AC said in a statement issued in Abuja yesterday by its national publicity secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed.

It said the issues that should interest the country’s anti-corruption agencies and the National Assembly should be whether the N27b contract passed through due process.

The party queried: Why was the Ministry of Health sidelined in the award of that contract by the Presidency? What is so critical about the contract that the Ministry of Health could not handle?

AC also wants Senator Obasanjo-Bello prosecuted for using a pseudonym (Damilola Akinlawon) at the signing of that MoU and Joint Venture Agreement, saying the act amounted to perjury and impersonation.

"Even if former President Obasanjo claims he did not know Iyabo had an interest in Akiya/M. Schneider, what happened to the much-touted due process under Obasanjo that it could not detect Iyabo’s involvement in Akiya?" the party further asked, adding that there may exist a relationship between the messed-up power contract and the current blackout being suffered by Nigerians.

AC said it believes that the revelations so far and those to come will support its strong conviction that Obasanjo ran the most corrupt administration in the history of Nigeria. "We therefore renew our call for an expansive probe of the Obasanjo years. It is only through a thorough probe of his administration, especially the oil industry, that the reality of the damage done to Nigeria by that administration can come to light," the party added.