ASSETS DECLARATION OF BUHARI AND OSIBANJO MADE PUBLIC

Muhammadu Buhari & Yemi Osibanjo

Tectono Business Review gathered that the President of the Republic of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, had less than N30 million in his account as at May 29 when he was sworn in as president. This revelation is contained in documents submitted by the president to the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB). The same day, his deputy, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo (SAN), had N94 million, $900,000 as well £19,000 in his accounts.


Actually, two of them filled and submitted their assets declaration forms to the CCB before they were sworn in, but the details were not made known to the public. It was yesterday that the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Garba Shehu, confirmed the information contained in the documents.

Wow!!! The austere lifestyle of President Buhari is quite disarming. He is a former Head of State and was at different times a governor, minister of petroleum and the head of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF) but prior to being sworn in on May 29, he had less than N30 million to his name. Also, he had only one bank account with the Union Bank. He had no foreign account, no factory and no enterprises.  He also had no registered company and no oil well.

Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, who had been a successful lawyer and university lecturer before his foray into politics, declared a balance of about N94 million, US$900,000 and £19,000 in his bank accounts with the foreign currencies kept in local domiciliary accounts. However, he declared that he had shares in Berger Paints, Union Bank and Skye Bank.  

The documents also revealed that Buhari had a total of five homes, and two mud houses in Daura.  He had two homes in Kaduna, one each in Kano, Daura and Abuja. One of the mud houses in Daura was inherited from his late elder sister, another from his late father.  He borrowed money from the old Barclays Bank to build two of his homes. He also had two undeveloped plots of land, one in Kano and the other in Port Harcourt.  In addition to the homes in Daura, he had farms, an orchard and a ranch. The total number of his holdings in the farm included 270 heads of cattle, 25 sheep, five horses, a variety of birds and a number of economic trees.  

President Buhari also used a number of cars, two of which he bought from his savings and the others supplied to him by the federal government in his capacity as a former Head of State. According to him, the rest were donated to him by well-wishers after his sports utility van (SUV) was damaged in a Boko Haram bomb attack on his convoy in July 2014.

The document also revealed that Prof. Osinbajo had four-bedroom residence at Victoria Garden City, Lagos, a three-bedroom flat at 2 Mosley Road, Ikoyi, a two-bedroom flat at the popular Redemption Camp along Lagos-Ibadan Expressway and a two-bedroom mortgaged property in Bedford, England. Apart from these, he had no other landed property. Aside his law firm, known as SimmonsCooper, he declared shareholding in six private companies based in Lagos, including Octogenerium Ltd., Windsor Grant Ltd., Tarapolsa, Vistorion Ltd., Aviva Ltd., and MTN Nigeria. His personal vehicles include one Infinity 4-Wheel Drive SUV, one Mercedes Benz and a Prado Jeep.