Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has criticised the resignation of the Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, Uche Nnaji, calling it “an attempt to whitewash yet another scandal.”
Nnaji tendered his resignation on Tuesday following a Premium Times investigation that accused him of submitting forged academic and National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) certificates to the Senate during his ministerial screening in 2023.
Both the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and the NYSC reportedly disowned the documents in question.
Reacting on Wednesday via a post on X, Atiku argued that Nnaji should have been dismissed and prosecuted rather than allowed to “quietly exit through the backdoor.”
He said, “Tuesday’s resignation of Uche Nnaji, Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, has once again brought to light the deep moral crisis … What should ordinarily be a matter of national shame is now being disguised as a ‘voluntary resignation’, an attempt to whitewash yet another scandal that typifies the forgery-ridden character of this government.
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“Let the truth be told: Uche Nnaji should not have been allowed the courtesy of resignation. He should have been summarily dismissed and prosecuted for deceit and falsification. By permitting him to quietly exit through the backdoor… again demonstrated that it is an assembly of forgers, impostors, and morally bankrupt individuals masquerading as public servants.”
Atiku also faulted the Department of State Services (DSS), alleging that the same agency which disqualified former Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai from ministerial screening on “security concerns” had cleared Nnaji despite inconsistencies in his credentials.
He stated, “What makes this even more embarrassing is that the same Department of State Services which screened out Mallam Nasir el-Rufai for alleged ‘security concerns’ is the very agency that cleared this same character, Uche Nnaji.”
The 2023 presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party linked the latest controversy to what he described as a recurring pattern of deceit “that begins from the very top.”
Atiku called for an independent probe into the academic records of all members of the Federal Executive Council, including the President, arguing that Nigerians deserved transparency from their leaders.
“Until this cleansing is done, Nigeria will continue to sink deeper into moral decay, economic ruin, and global embarrassment,” he said.
As of press time, neither the Presidency nor the DSS had issued any response to Atiku’s allegations.
