By Ayomide Oriade
It has turned out that suspended Central Bank of Nigeria Governor had been expecting the federal government to take some punitive action against him for his decision to speak boldly against perceived wrongs in the polity. In an interview on CHANNELS television monitored by BRANDPOWER, Sanusi indeed wondered “I wonder what took them so long…”
Though the embattled governor has sworn not to go back to the job, he has nonetheless declared that he will proceed to the courts to challenge if the President indeed has the powers to suspend the CBN Governor noting that he believed in strengthening the system so that subsequent CBN governors’ independence would not be trampled upon and may not have the boldness to speak out when things are going wrong. Sanusi also declared that “you can suspend me but you can’t suspend the truth”.
Sanusi further stated that he had no regrets whatsoever for the decisions that he took while at the helm at the CBN both in official and personal capacity. Meanwhile Sanusi was away in the Republic of Niger attending an ECOWAS meeting when the Nigerian ambassador to that country informed him of his suspension.
Nigerians await with bated breath to see the outcome of Sanusi’s judicial challenge of the president’s authority in court especially in view of the circumstances surrounding the same effort by the now retired Justice Ayo Salami, who though was reinstated by the courts on the basis that his suspension was illegal never got reinstated by the federal government until his retirement.
