FIRE GUTTED ACCOUNTANT GENERAL’S OFFICE: AN ARSON OR ACCIDENT?

It is no longer news that the Capital Unit of the Treasury House where the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation is located, was gutted by fire on Wednesday morning, 8^th April.

      The Capital Unit in the OAGF’s office is where the money to be spent by the ministries, departments, and agencies of government are made and released.

      As would be expected, this incident sparked reactions, albeit, negative ones from the polity. The first vitriolic reaction came from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). According to reports gotten from highly credible national dailies, the party’s national publicity secretary made its position known by wondering why the fire incident should occur when it did.

      According to reports from the national dailies, the PDP was highly suspicious of the timing of the fire incident. They wondered why the incident should occur at the time calls were being made for “a forensic audit into the hazy oil-subsidy regime of the President Buhari-led administration for which trillions of naira are being claimed to have been spent”.

      The main opposition party’s spokesman, according to reports, went further by saying that; “this is in addition to recent demands”, into allegations of financial wrongdoings and fraud in relation to the alleged diversion of COVID-19 intervention funds and, the administration’s social investments programmes since 2015. He went further by saying that, the PDP spearheaded the demands by Nigerians to the National Assembly to investigate these social incentives programmes spending.

      Thus, the PDP demanded an unbiased investigation into the unfortunate fire incident.

 The body’s spokesperson wondered why the fire incident occurred a few hours after a normally “docile and pliant National Assembly” raised issues of suspicion of fraud and misuse of public funds running into multiples of billions of naira.

       Speaking on the same fire incident according to highly respected national dailies. The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), viewed the incident with huge disapproval. The body’s spokesperson wondered why the fire incident occurred a few hours after a normally “docile and pliant National Assembly” raised issues of suspicion of fraud and misuse of public funds running into multiples of billions of naira.

          The HURIWA spokesperson wondered why a fire would suddenly gut the OAGF’s office only hours “after the Senate uncovered an alleged monumental heist in the Federal Government’s school feeding programmes.” They insisted that a forensic investigation be carried out, to ascertain the true causes of the fire.

         The human rights organisation and other highly placed personalities in the human rights community were highly cynical about the timing of the fire incident. They couldn’t help pointing out how shoddy the management of government resources was. This they said was evident from the fact that media reports are always claiming that the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), the Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS), and other entities; claimed to have generated billions of naira in revenue for the government. Yet, the minister for finance still has to run helter-skelter, with cap in hand, seeking foreign loans. This makes the government’s position very watery.

           However, when all is said and done, was this truly an accident; or an act of economic sabotage? The answer to that will always be highly speculative. Now, let’s take a closer look at the issues.

         No government in the world, no matter how backward, deals with physical cash in its operations. Although countries like Nigeria are still relatively unsophisticated compared to the western world, money issues are mostly electronic. This means that no really significant sum of money could have been lost in the fire, except, petty cash used in running the office. It would be extremely absurd for anybody, no matter how disturbed, to torch a government building to cover up the stealing of petty cash.

          Conversely, the loss of extremely sensitive documentation would be staggering. Files, internal memoranda detailing sensitive instructions, sensitive intra-departmental policy thrusts, top-secret documentation, etc.; would definitely have been lost to the conflagration. Unless all documents also existed in soft copy, which is highly unlikely, given the sensitivity of certain documents, some things of importance are gone forever. Then there’s the issue of continuity, which cannot be done in an electronic format.

        However, the authority’s explanations that the fire was caused by a faulty air conditioning unit are also highly plausible; since that has been known to happen. Air conditioning units have reduced many houses to ashes. This is a fact. Unfortunately, the timing of the incident makes it highly suspicious.

        Whichever way you look at it, the losers in this unfortunate incident are Nigerians. So, what do you think happened? Let me know through your comments below.