The aviation sector of the Nigerian economy has been going through turbulent period since 2013 when the two BMW bullet cars involving the Minister, Stella Oduah, broke. This is despite the fact that the sector has been going through a rapid transformation.
Just when Nigerians thought that the storm was over, Oduah was hit with an alleged certificate forgery scam. Her Masters degree’s claim from a US college was discovered to be fake, while only on Wednesday, another story broke online that she was never awarded an honourary doctorate from Pacific Christian College, USA.
After the story broke, Aproko247 contacted the said university, which is now called Hope Christian University, to confirm through their records if the report was true. One of their members of staff, who spoke with this magazine, disclosed that no honourary doctorate degree was given to the name ‘Stella Oduah’, according to their records.
However, Paparazzi Magazine has reported that the House of Representatives Aviation Committee Chairperson, Hon Nkiruka Chidubem Onyejeocha, is allegedly one of the brains behind the ‘Stella Oduah must go’ campaign.
The magazine claimed that the lawmaker has been used by some to bring down the minister. Below is the Paparazzi’s story;
It is no longer news that the minister of Aviation, Ms Stella Oduah, has been in the eye of the storm for many months, as her sworn enemies, who she said have entrenched interests in the aviation industry, keep bringing new twists into their declared war against her, despite widespread opinion that she has outperformed all other aviation ministers before her.
What is however news is what Paparazzi Magazine, through painstaking investigation, unearthed concerning one of her now-exposed sworn enemies, who by law, is supposed to be performing legislative oversight functions on the aviation ministry and its agencies. Paparazzi investigation has revealed that the Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Aviation, Hon Nkiruka Chidubem Onyejeocha, might have been acting out a written script in her handling of the now infamous investigations into the bullet proof car procurement by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, and also at the same time, pursuing a personal vendetta against the minister.
According to sources in the aviation industry, Hon Onyejeocha is voicing out a script written by “entrenched interests” in the aviation industry, who have found in her a willing ally in prosecuting their war against the minister. This revelation is most astonishing because our investigation revealed that Hon Onyejeocha has been demanding for and receiving various gifts including cash running into thousands of dollars from the minister’s office and other aviation stakeholders.
According to a source who does not want to be named, “The House of Representatives Committee on Aviation chairman is only acting out her own part in the war that has been declared by enemies of the minister. She is an Igbo woman, just like the minister, and those using her found out that it will be easier to use the minister’s kinswoman against her and she is doing their bidding with perfection.”
Aside doing the dictates of her paymasters, from whom she is said to have been benefitting immensely, our source also hinted that she has an axe to grind with the minister because of the minister’s reluctance to meet all her outrageous financial demands, which the source says has become overbearing and rather too frequent. Two instances of these outrageous demands, for which Paparazzi has proof, were when she demanded and got first class tickets to Canada to attend the inauguration of Dr Olumuyiwa Benard Aliu who was to be inaugurated as the first African head of the International Civil Aviation Organisation. The other instance, our source said was when she demanded for the sum of $500,000 {Five hundred thousand US Dollars} from the aviation ministry but was given $250,000 {Two hundred and fifty thousand US Dollars}. This, our source said, got the honourable member representing Isuikwuato/Umunneochi, Federal Constituency angry, for which she vowed to bring the minister down.
“The honourable member has overtime displayed an insatiable appetite that those in the aviation industry are finding increasingly difficult to satisfy. She comes with crazy demands and if you are not able to meet it, you are threatened or blackmailed. This woman has left her constitutional duties and she is now pursuing personal vendetta against whoever she thinks is stopping her from whatever largesse she thinks she is entitled to. That is the genesis of the minister’s problems with her”, submitted the source.
Another inside source in one of the aviation agencies in Lagos also confided in Paparazzi that Hon Onyejeocha has become a pain in the neck for agencies under the aviation ministry and that they can only hope that something happens to quickly change the tide.
“Most of the problems the aviation agencies have today are orchestrated because of the collusion of interests. If the chairman of the House Committee on Aviation is going to be sincere with herself, she will readily admit to this. This woman has been on the neck of FAAN, NCAA etc for one thing or the other. We in the agencies are tired of her overbearing attitude and demands. This is an ordinary member of the House of Representatives who is only privileged to chair the committee on aviation but she demands from us to give her a convoy of cars whenever she visits Lagos, notwithstanding what purpose it is used for. Tell me what she will do if she is made the minister? Will she not buy a private jet as official plane? There is so much insincerity going on with what her committee is doing; we don’t have a problem with the House doing its job constitutionally but when you now allow personally interest to overshadow your sense of judgement, then it becomes a fundamental problem”, the source said.
For a woman, who on her official page in the House website said her interest is “to see the position of the women move to the next level and also help pass laws that will help ordinary Nigerians”, her actions and declared on war on a fellow woman and kinswoman leaves a lot to be desired. According to one of our sources, “Hon Onyejeocha is just another opportunistic Nigerian politician who believes she must use her position to acquire ill-gotten wealth and cut down whoever dare stand on her way.”
Additional information by Paparazzi Magazine.
