No. 1, Bypass Junction, Akure, Ondo State
08062204655
Our Ref:…A.N. OBA/2023/061…. Your Ref:………… Date:…2nd August, 2023…
H.E. Godwin Akpabio,
The Senate President,
National Assembly Complex,
FCT, Abuja.
Your Excellency,
ATTEMPT TO COVER UP HON. BUNMI TUNJI OJO ON ILLEGAL PROCUREMENT OF N.Y.S.C. DISCHARGE CERTIFICATE: A SHOW OF SHAME AND THE NEED TO WITHDRAW THE CONFIRMATION OF HON. BUNMI TUNJI OJO AS MINISTER–DESIGNATE FORTHWITH
We are solicitors to Gbadamosi Olamilekan, Adejoba Muyiwa and Alabi Adebowale (for themselves and on behalf of entire members of Association for Honest and Transparent Leaders in Governance) (“Our Clients”). We have the perfect instruction of our clients to write you on the terms as hereunder.
Our clients are a group of eminent citizens of Nigeria who are very keen in promoting honesty and transparency in governance and particularly ensuring persons appointed in positions of authority in Nigeria are of proven integrity.
Our clients reliably briefed us that they were privileged to view the proceedings of the Nigerian 10th senate wherein the ministers nominees nominated by the president were been screened for confirmation. And particularly the screening of the aforementioned Hon. Bunmi Tunji Ojo caught their attention at the point where Senator Sadiq observed discrepancies in the N.Y.S.C certificate and the age of the minister–designate which prompted our clients to delve into the issue very meticulously and discreetly.
Your Excellency, it is a stubborn fact that it is the conventional practice and law of the N.Y.S.C for discharged certificates to be signed and dated the very day the particular batch of the scheme ends and passed out. The N.Y.S.C certificates generally do not post date the passing out date of the batch the corps member belong to. This is not the case as far as Hon. Bunmi Tunji Ojo’s instance as per his own discharge certificate. Hon. Ojo claimed to have served between 28th November 2019 and 27th November 2020 but his certificate was dated 28th February 2023. We hold this to be fatal flaw in the certificate purportedly claimed to have been issued by the Directorate of National Youth Service Corps.
Furthermore sir, it is an undisputable fact that Hon. Bunmi TunjiOjo was a member of the 9th National Assembly as member of the House of Representatives and Chairman of the House Committee on N.D.D.C. The lifespan of the 9th Assembly was between June 2019 and June 2023 and he claimed to serve this nation as a Youth Corper between November 2019 and November 2020, a period that is within the period that he served as an acclaimed honourablemember of the House of Representatives of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We hold that a single person cannot be at two places at the same time undertaking official responsibilities as claimed by Hon. Tunji Ojo.
Flowing from the foregoing, we submit without any equivocation and categorically that the purported discharge certificate Hon. Bunmi Tunji Ojo submitted to the Nigerian Senate for his screening fell short of standard of the N.Y.S.C. We submit further that the discharge certificate is forged or it was procured fraudulently. And it is imperative to state emphatically and unequivocally that the attempt to cover him up by Senator AdeniyiAdegbonmire, SAN by asking Hon. Tunji Ojo to take a bow when he could not give a satisfactory explanation at the floor of the senate is tantamount to show of shame and a clear attempt to cover up clandestine acts of people in position of authourity.
Sir, it is our vehement opinion that there are sharp and clandestine practices involving the issuance of the discharge certificate involving member(s) of the National Youth Service Corps if it was actually issued by your office and signed by you considering the fact that Hon Bunmi Tunji Ojo was serving at the National Assembly as an acclaimed honourable member of the House of Representatives during the time he claimed to have satisfactorily completed one year of national youth service from 28th November 2019 to 27th November, 2020 in accordance with section II of the National Youth Service Corps Act Cap N84, LFN 2004.
Section II of the Act provides thus:
“The Directorate shall on completion of the service of a member of the service of a member of the corps unless such person is exempted under section 17 of this Act issue him with a certificate of National Service which shall contain such particulars as may be prescribed ”
(“shall”–emphasis mine)
On the ground of the afore–position of law, we submit that it is mandatory for the Directorate to issue the Discharge Certificate on completion of the National Youth Service immediately and not at a future time.
It is also obvious that Hon. Bunmi Tunji Ojo claimed to undertake the national youth service over thirteen years after he had gotten his first degree without an approval of the National Defence and Security Council which negates the provisions of Section 17 of the National Youth Service Corps Act (Supra).
To this end Your Excellency, we humbly urge you to use your high esteem office to order for the recall of the said Bunmi Tunji Ojofor more interrogation on the authenticity of his Discharge Certificate. And that the Senate should withdraw the confirmation of Bunmi Tunji Ojo as a minister–designate in event he cannot defend the issues we outlined in this petition. This will be the most honourable step(s) to be taken in order to protect the image of the 10th senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The Discharge Certificate is herewith attached for your reference sir.
With the assurances of our professional regards.
Yours faithfully,
PP: A.N. Obafemi Bawa & Associates
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