Sagay said Sani's views are tainted by his political travails in the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Chairman of the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption (PACAC), Prof Itse Sagay (SAN), has berated Senator Shehu Sani for his recent anti-Buhari statement.
Sani, an APC lawmaker representing Kaduna Central in the Red Chamber had rubbished the President Muhammadu Buhari's letter that cleared the Acting chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu of corruption allegations.
Buhari in the letter also rejected the Senate's demand for the sack and prosecution of Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir Lawal after a senate committee headed by Sani indicted him.
Sani said the present administration is treating corruption in government with "deodorant," and accused the President of double standards.
"Corruption in the Judiciary and others is treated with insecticide while corruption in the Presidency is treated with deodorant," Sani said on Tuesday after the Senate President Bukola Saraki read Buhari's letter.
But Sagay faulted the statement, saying Sani is fighting his own political "battles" which influence his views.
He said SGF should be given a fair hearing by the Senate before being condemned.
"With regards to the SGF, I don’t really know much about that. My own view is that they should give him a hearing and if at the end of it, they consider that he’s liable, then they should come to the conclusion and condemn him if they want. But they should give him a hearing. That’s all," he said.
The senior lawyer expressed disappointment at Sani's utterances, whom he said, should have stood up for Magu whose nomination as EFCC chairman was first rejected by the Senate before he was re-nominated.
He said: "I don’t really know the basis of that comment he made. I think it’s a political statement. It’s not factual.
"He’s a political antagonist of his own party. He doesn’t get on well with the governor of his state, and he doesn’t get on with the Federal Government. So it is his political battle that is colouring his statement. It’s not factual.
"I don’t know too much about the Secretary to the Federal Government, I must confess that. I don’t know much about that.
"But I know the case of Magu thoroughly. And the allegations are spurious. There is no reality in them. The whole thing was distorted to give a wrong impression about Magu.
"You as a journalist, I know you people investigate. You know a lot. The allegations are all false. He did not rent a flat by himself; he was put in a house by government. So what is his business if government paid more than it should have paid?
"It’s all just cooked up to prevent him from being appointed. So I don’t see why a senator should attack the presidency for returning Magu’s nomination to the Senate.
"I expected Senator Sani as a human rights person, as far as I know, a person from the civil society, that he should have stood up for the truth. He should have known that Magu was victimised deliberately. He should have stood against that.
"He should have stood for the oppressed person who has been doing a marvelous work in the fight against corruption. But this time he stood on the wrong side.
"Maybe the Senate has its own interest which is contrary to the interest of the country. And he’s standing with that Senate in that regard. So, that’s his business."
The SGF was indicted for his alleged shady role in the handling of a grass cutting contract awarded by the Presidential Initiative on Northeast (PINE).
But Buhari in his letter said he would not sack Lawal as demanded by the upper chamber because the report of the Senate Ad hoc committee was signed by three of nine members.
He also said the Lawal was not given fair hearing.
Sani, who chaired the ad hoc committee and presented the interim report that indicted Lawal last December, said seven members, not three as claimed by the president, signed the report.
According to him, Lawal was invited to appear before the committee, adding the SGF’s secretary received and acknowledged the invitation.
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