Dikko bows to pressure to resign

FUNSO OLOJO

AlhajiAbdullahiDikko, unarguably the longest serving and most successful Comptroller- General of Customs, has finally decided to quit the service he ruled for six years.

Contrary to the dummy sold to the public that the Katsina State-born Customs egghead voluntarily resigned his appointment, competent sources confided in Hallmark that the shrewd administrator succumbed to intense pressure to throw in the towel.

It was gathered that Dikko gave the Federal government 10 days – notice to resign which is expected to elapse next week Tuesday.

However, there are two factions of why the Customs strongman decided to call it quit from the job he has passionately love and doggedly protected in the last six years.

One faction swore that the close associates of the Customs strongman advised him to quit while the ovation is loudest.

Their argument, it was gathered, was that it would be better for Dikkpo to voluntarily resign now rather than wait to be booted out and the hounds from the EFCC are let loose on him.

”Apart from his fabled achievements, the prominent features which sign-posted his tenure were controversies. His years in Customs were steeped in controversies which bordered on alleged financial impropriety. So the most honourable thing for him to do was to resign before his alleged sins catch up with him”,  a maritime operator averred.

Another faction alleged that Dikko, relying on his vast connection and intelligence–gathering network, read the mood of the present government and discovered that the wisest thing to do was to resign before he is booted out.

”It was an altruistic decision to take. Having gauged the no- nonsense mood of President Mohammed Buhari as somebody who  does not brood anything less than transparent as well as knowing he does not stand the faintest chance of withstanding the rampaging Buhari probing eyes to secure his tenure, he did what a sensible person should do under such circumstance, resign”, another respondent who strongly craved for anonymity, declared.

However, the common denominator in the two claims was that Dikko’s sudden resignation was in deferment to the inscrutable mind of President Buhari, whose favour, sources claimed, the Customs egghead has unsuccessfully tried to curry.

It would be recalled that prior to the swearing-in of President Buhari after his victory at the 2015 General election, Dikko allegedly joined the numbers of prominent office holders who, under the guise of paying homage to him, visited the retired Army general at his Daura country home where he was allegedly given a cold shoulder.

Though the incident was later denied by the Customs authority, but sources claimed that it was one of such several efforts made by the Customs boss to worm his way into the heart of the President.

”He would have loved to stay. After all, he had doggedly warded off all the intruders to the Customs stool which he jealously guarded in the last six years”, a knowledgeable source observed.

” Why did he have to wait this long to resign?. If he has sincerely and genuinely wanted to resign and not that he was pressurized to go, he would not have even lobbied and gotten an extension to this four-year tenure which elapsed two years ago”, another respondent queried.

” If not for the un favourable signal he may have receive, Dikko would not have resigned” yet another source averred.

AlhajiDikko has suffered several attacks and intrigues that bwere meant to unseat him from the exalted seat which he had tenaciously held on to for the past six year, making him the longest serving Customs CG in the history of the service.

Appointed in August 2009 by late Musa Ya’Adua administration for a renuable tenure of four years.

However, in August 2013 when he tenure expired, the former President Goodluck Jonathan kept mum on the raging controversy and uncertainty around the tenure of the Customs egghead.

The Jonathan Presidency neither confirmed nor denied the rummoured tenure elongation of the Customs boss, thus given the Katsina state-born Customs icon an open-ended tenure.

However, stakeholders in the maritime industry have reacted differently over the resignation of Dikko.

Some members of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Custom Agents(ANLCA), prior to his resignation, have called for his removal from office.

They even asked President Buhari to probe the Customs CG for what they called ”his monumental fraud” in office.

The President of the Assoiciation,PrinceOlayiwolaShittu, later exonorated his members from the call to sack the CG.

Incidentally, Dikko was thesingle biggest financial contributor to the construction og the maginificient permanent Secrectariat of ANLCA for which the edifice was named after him.

However, the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF),has called of President Buhari to reject the resignation of Dikko to enable him complete his reform of the service which he initiated few years ago.

The NAGAFF Head of Special Duties, DipoOlayoku , in a press statement, described the Customs boss as ”a trail blazer, an Icon who within six years of functioning as a CGC, had transformed the service into a fearless, dynamic and vibrant organization able to entrench honour, integrity and knowledge in a zero- tolerance war, against corruption”

“Whereas there are those severally calling for his exit to enable their criminal acts against the Nigerian state, we did ask Mr. President to extend his tenure to August 2016 to enable the last stage of his reforms”, the NAGAFF emphasized, honouringDikko with the award of the “Veteran of Customs Reforms in Nigeria.”

“The shoe he is leaving behind is quite too big in the area of revenue function, anti-smuggling, infrastructure, welfare of officers, capacity building, information technology, innovation in risk management technique, trade facilitation and partnership in Customs operations, trade intelligence gathering and international affiliations”, NAGAFF noted.

However, President Buhari has accepted the resignation of the Customs boss and a search for his replacement has ensued.