Opposition knocks Senate, DSS over minister’s forgery allegation

The opposition has faulted the Senate and the Department of State Services (DSS) for failing to ensure an error-free vetting process based on the current allegation of certificate forgery involving minister of science and technology, Uchenna Nnaji.

In a statement signed by its spokesperson Bolaji Abdullai, the African Democratic Congress, insinuated President Tinubu had pocketed the Senate, hence its complacency. “A senate that has obliged itself unreservedly to the will of the president is liable to fail in its duty to the people,” Abdullai said in the statement.

The party wondered why President Tinubu is retaining Nnaji “despite mounting evidence and public outrage.” He adds that Nnaji’s case is “part of a “long, public, and familiar record” of certificate scandals involving senior officials in the All Progressives Congress (APC) government.

He said, “These recurring scandals and the persistent stench of certificate forgery are indeed reflective of a party that is foundationally accommodating of deceit and clearly unbothered by basic ethical considerations.

“If the minister is not honourable enough to resign, why is the Tinubu administration still keeping him in office?

“By refusing to act, the Tinubu government and the APC are admitting their complicity in such fraudulent conduct at the highest levels of their government and making a mockery of their claims to be fighting corruption.”

“Certificate forgery is not a clerical error; it is a crime. If proven, it must attract the full weight of the law,” Abdullahi said.