Emir of Kano, Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi 11, said the former Minister Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, was extremely powerful during the administration of ex-President, Goodluck Jonathan.

In a recent Forbes TV interview with Peace Hyde, the monarch said no one ever opposed Diezani, and came out unscathed.

“I knew that taking on the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation was taking on the most powerful minister in Jonathan’s government, and nobody who had touched Diezani had survived. It was not a question of what would happen, I just didn’t care at that time. I did not want to go down in history as having seen this and kept quiet.”

“After the first round of reconciliation, there was $29bn that was explained. And how was that explained? Crude that was shipped by NNPC did not entirely belong to NNPC.”

“No reasonable explanation for $20bn, $6bn was with NPDC that had not gotten to the federation account till date.”

Sanusi further stated that the former President was livid with him over the letter he wrote to him about the missing $49bn from the account of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.

Sanusi, a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, said even though he wrote the letter to Jonathan in August 2013, the ex-President took no action until four months later when it was apparent that the letter was leaked to another past president, Olusegun Obasanjo.

“In the middle of all these, the President called me and said I should see him at 3pm. I turned up at 3pm and the entire place had been swept. There was no one apart from security services. I got to his office, it was just me and him. It was as if everybody had been asked to go.”

“And so he says to me, he’s calling me because he is surprised that the letter I wrote to him got to Obasanjo, I said I’m surprised too. He said he was convinced that the letter went from the CBN to Obasanjo, and I had 24 hours to find who leaked the letter or sack somebody; the director who prepared the letter or my secretary and if I did not sack them, it was proof that I leaked the letter and therefore, I should resign.”

“I said to him that I’m surprised that I’m being asked to resign for raising an alarm over missing funds and the minister in charge of the portfolio is not being asked to resign.”

“From then I knew I had signed my equivalent of a death warrant. But I said I was not resigning. He got very angry and said whether you like it or not, you’re going to leave that office, I cannot continue to work with you, either you or I will leave government.”