By Bassey Udo
Years after she voluntarily resigned her appointment as Finance Minister in the Muhammadu Buhari administration in September 2018, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, insists she took the right decision in the circumstance to protect the integrity of the office.
Mrs Adeosun voluntarily resigned from office in the wake of the controversy that surrounded her alleged exemption from the one-year mandatory National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) service programme.
But speaking as a guest on a Channels Television’s programme, Inside Sources with Laolu Akande on Friday Adeosun said several years after her decision to quit, she still believes it was the right decision she took.
She maintained that her resignation was a deliberate decision taken to protect the integrity of the Office of the Minister of Finance, and to allow her to clear her reputation legally.
“People keep asking why I resigned? They said no one has ever resigned as Minister of Finance like I did? But I still think it was the right thing for me to do,” she said.
“My resignation was a matter of principle and not in any way an admission of wrongdoing. It was a step to protect the integrity of the Office of the Minister of Finance and to defend my reputation. I couldn’t be attending local and international meetings as Minister of Finance, while appearing in court to defend myself in a case of integrity and reputation. That would have been inappropriate,” she added.
“I knew I would need to go to court to clear my name, and doing so was not compatible with choosing to remain in office as Minister of Finance, representing Nigeria at the highest level.
“So, I went to see Mr. President, to tell him I needed to go. I needed to go to court, because I had to clear my name. Mr. President supported my decision to approach the court to clear my name through legal means.
“These names are leased for our children and our grandchildren. You don’t destroy your name because you want to stay in office as minister.”
At the end of the court process over the application for constitutional interpretation filed in March 2021 by the firm of Chief Wole Olanipekun, a senior advocate of Nigeria (SAN), on behalf of Adeosun, the Federal High Court in Abuja, in July 2021, ruled that Adeosun was ineligible for National Youth Service Corps.
The court in its ruling declared that the former Minister should not have presented herself for National Youth Service in the first place, because under the provisions of the 1979 Constitution, which was in force at the time of her graduation, she was not a Nigerian citizen either at the time of her graduation or when she turned 30, the mandatory cut off age for those qualified to be mobilized to participate in the one-year paramilitary programme.
Adeosun graduated from the University of East London in 1989 at the age of 22.
The court, presided by Justice Taiwo Taiwo, had ruled that Adeosun’s appointment as Minister was neither illegal nor unconstitutional, as the Constitution did not require her to present her first-degree certificate or any other certificate, including the NYSC certificate, to be appointed a minister.
The court said since the 1979 Constitution, which was in force at the time, did not recognise dual citizenship, Adeosun could not have served, because of her status as a British citizen.
The court ruled that Nigerian citizenship only reverted under extant constitution by which time Adeosun was well above 30, and by the court ruling ineligible to participate in NYSC scheme, as the scheme is exclusively reserved for Nigerians.
