The National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, has called on President Bola Tinubu to probe the mismanagement of the Ajaokuta Steel Company Limited, as the administration starts the resuscitation of the project.

In a statement on Sunday by the Universal President of NANS, Comrade Lucky Emonefe, it said the Tinubu administration has done well by embarking on the resuscitation of the project, but that it should look into how it was mismanaged in the past.

“The leadership of the National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, wants to sincerely appreciate H.E. Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, for the humongous effort he has put into the development of the Ajaokuta Steel Company and National Iron Ore Mining Company, Itakpe, since he assumed office.

From history, apart from the Shehu Shagari era, this will be the first time that this company would be having this kind of unusual support from the Federal Government. This is highly commendable.

We also want to appreciate the office of the Senate President, Distinguished Senator Godswill Akpabio, for his huge and tireless efforts in making sure that this company comes back on its feet and delivers the purpose for which it was founded. All his efforts are seen and they won’t go unappreciated.

“Finally we want to thank members of the National Assembly especially Senator Natasha Uduaghan-Akpoti, who raised the issue and others who supported. We believe that their efforts shall not go unrewarded and their wishes towards the progress of Ajaokuta Steel Company will come to materialization in no distant time.

“Ajaokuta Steel Company and National Iron Ore Mining Company have remained comatose, but resuscitation plans of the projects are near with the attraction of investors in topmost gear. The government and the stakeholders alike are working assiduously to see that the company comes back to life. This is a good omen for the Renewed Hope Agenda to continue to flourish amidst the global economic crisis that has engulfed the world right now.“It is also worthy of note that the set of individuals who brought the Ajaokuta Steel Company to this comatose state are still walking the street uninvestigated and unpunished. These people who have been indicted to the tune of several millions of US dollars further siphoned $496m in September 2022 during the Buhari administration. They have neither been probed nor punished. This is not a good precedence at all and if unchecked would create an avenue for dabbling into President Tinubu’s efforts of resuscitating the steel plant.

“These individuals including past corrupt government executives denied the public, most especially the youth, the benefit of job opportunities, technological exposure and economic emancipation that would have massively accrued to us all these while if they had done what was expected of them. They selfishly and callously mismanaged Ajaokuta Steel Company and grounded it with the notion that nothing will happen in the end. If acts like these go uninvestigated and unpunished, what is now the tendency that after rebuilding, some other people would not come and do the same thing to loot and ground it again the umpteenth time? This should not be so.”

NANS therefore called on the President to bring the offenders to book.
“This is simply because if these offenders are brought to book, it will serve as a deterrent to others who are aspiring to steal from the company as soon as it starts operation again. Bringing them to book will help the company grow in the sense that the money recovered from these offenders would be pumped back into the company and it will give it a higher lift in every sense.”

The association noted that probing the activities of looters of the company would not disrupt the effort to revamp it.
It also called for the decentralisation of power in the company and not allowing for playing the tribal politics in running it.