"Why I Won’t Resign Over Immigration Tragedy" - Abba Moro

Abba Moro, the Minister of Interior has said he would not resign over the immigration tragedy that claimed the lives some job applicant.

Speaking on Monday, the minister explained why he will not resign seven months after the tragic incident happened, Premium Times reports.

It would be recalled that on March 15, 2014, a poorly organised recruitment exercise claimed the lives of no fewer than 20 applicants following a stamped that occurred at the venue of the exercise across the country.

Minister of Interior, Abba Moro

In reaction to the incident, several Nigerians called for Moro’s sack as well as that of the Comptroller-General of Immigration, David Parradang. They also requested that the duo should be prosecuted for involuntary homicide over the sham recruitment process that enabled the interior ministry to extort at least N520 million in compulsory levies imposed on applicants.

Moro, who initially attributed the tragedy on impatience and refusal by applicants to stick to the instructions given, had since accepted responsibility for the incident.

The minister while speaking on a Channels TV programme, ‘Sunrise’ said he would not resign, but would rather stay in office in order to clean the mess the incident caused.

“The point at which we are now is not about resignation. That time has gone,” Mr. Morro said in respond to a question over why he refused to quit despite widespread calls by Nigerians on him to do so. “At the time (people were calling for his resignation), I think emotions were very high. I was in the eye of a storm. At that time, a lot of options were on the table… The issue is do you resign or do you stay to sort out the problem that have been created? I decided that staying and mopping up the mess caused by the lack of proper implementation of our plans is better. That’s point we are now,” Moro said.

According to him, Nigerians should consider the incident as an accident he did not plan for. He said he too has a family and would not set out on such a journey knowing that accident would happen and even result to the death of people.

He said everything was taken into proper perspective, adding that if they had succeeded, only few Nigerians would have commended them for a good job. He said the only thing left now is to learn from what happened.

The minister further explained why his ministry was yet to implement a directive by President Goodluck Jonathan that three family members of each dead applicant should be given automatic employments.

He said after the announcement, the Federal Government also set up a committee over the recruitment tragedy which he said his ministry is waiting for the panel to present its report before acting.
“Finally, the report is ready, waiting for submission and implementation. The next level is implementation. What I can say is that the people affected should exercise understanding and patience. Nobody will allow further mistakes,” he said.

Meanwhile, it was reported that 4,556 vacancies were advertised by the immigration service, but 520,000 applicants registered to write the test in March 15, 2014. Each applicant was compelled to pay the sum of N1, 000 as processing fees before writing the test.

It was gathered that the agency made a whooping sum of N520 million from this compulsory levy that was imposed on the applicants. The move however, breached the directive issued by the House of Representatives that government agency should stop collecting money from applicants.

Moro sparked Nigerians anger when he first blamed the deaths of the applicants on ‘impatience’, a statement that made many Nigerians take to social media to demand his immediate sack.

“The applicants lost their lives due to impatience; they did not follow the laid down procedures spelt out to them before the exercise. Many of them jumped through the fences of affected centres and did not conduct themselves in an orderly manner to make the exercise a smooth one,” Moro said.

Although the Federal Government and the National Assembly had constituted separate committees to investigate the tragic incident, the reports of the committees are yet to be known.