$50billion saga: I will not resign, Sanusi tells Jonathan

 

Credits: punchng.com

According to THISDAY, President Goodluck Jonathan has asked the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, to resign immediately on the ground that he allegedly leaked his letter on the unremitted $49.8 billion oil revenue to former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

President Jonathan has accused the Sanusi of leaking the controversial letter to Obasanjo which has generated public interest.

Sanusi has however strongly  denied any leakage , saying he cannot be held responsible for a ‘crime’ he did not commit. He told the president during the heated telephone exchange that he could only be removed by two-thirds of the Senate as required by law.

It was reported  that the president had called Sanusi and accused him of leaking the letter to Obasanjo, which enabled the latter to use it as one of many allegations he levelled against Jonathan in his letter titled: “Before It is Too Late”.
 
Jonathan, was said to have asked Sanusi, whose terminal leave begins in March, to tender his resignation before the close of business last Tuesday.

During the heated conversation, the CBN Governor informed the president that the letter was available in the presidential villa, the Finance Ministry as well as the Central Bank, wondering how he (Sanusi) could have leaked the letter when any other government official or civil servant could have forwarded the letter to Obasanjo.

Sanusi also expressed his surprise that he was the one being asked to resign, instead of the president to ask those responsible for the non-remittance of the funds to resign.

His response, which threw the president aback, degenerated into a heated exchange during which Sanusi told the president that as the federal government’s Chief Economic Adviser, mandatorily required to bring issues of critical economic importance to the attention of the president, he had done a patriotic duty to his country.

“He informed the President that it is necessary to deal with the issues and not the letter that had been leaked since it has since been established that it was not $49.8 billion that had not been remitted to the Federation Account, but $10.8 billion, which was still in dispute and by any stretch of imagination was still a large sum.

But the president was said to have remained adamant and insisted on the CBN governor’s resignation