How Whistleblowers End Up As Victims — The George Uboh Case Study

A very recent development has revealed the hard tackles facing whistleblowers while trying to secure the dues legally accruing to them.

A closer look will reveal that some of them end up with mere hand shake after their revelations must have paid off and the stolen stash recovered.

 A good case study was the one involving the foremost whistleblower in Nigeria, George Uboh, who has to drag the Senate to recover $410,000 due to him.

According to a report published earlier by Elombah.com, he went to court due to efforts by the Ad Hoc Committee on petition to pull a smart game in the compensation due to him.

The report continued:

“Dr Uboh had blown the whistle on Chevron Nigeria Limited in a deal that sucked 4.1 million Dollars off the coffers of federal government of Nigeria.

“Going by the whistleblowing act, he is entitled to %10 which totals 410 thousand Dollars after the said money must have been recovered.

“Incidentally, however, the Senate failed to “put proper modalities in place to see that 10% of the recovered sum based on plaintiff’s petition is paid to him as evidenced by Defendant’s refusal to put any agreement tom that effect in writing”.

Elombah.com reported that “trouble then blew open on June 8, 2017, when George Uboh received invitation to an interactive session with the Senate Ad Hoc Committee on the petition, Mr Nnaji John on behalf of the chairman.

“The interactive session, which was slated for Wednesday, July 14, 2017, was to coerce Uboh to supply more facts to pursue the substance of his petition after he withdrew the said petition.

“The renowned whistleblower, sensing some anomalies in the procedure, petitioned the Federal High Court in Abuja.”

He sought a court “order directing the Defendants to pay the plaintiff 10% of the sum of $4,100.079.00 for already supplying the Defendants information for the recovery $4,100.079.00 from Chevron Nigeria Limited.”

Now the question on the lips of those who are privy to the development is: If the foremost whistleblower in Nigeria could face such ridicule, what of the commoners?

What could have happened if it were some dude who has no access to a lawyer, how much more filing a suit at the Federal high Court?

Moreover, how many dare-devils could muster the guts to withstand the highest legislative body in the country, especially where and when money is involved?

This latest episode will typify the agonies and ridicule whistleblowers are being subjected to especially where it involves the high and mighty of the society.

A funny episode, however, involves a whistleblower who allegedly fed security operatives wrong information and the agents went charging into the home of the Deputy Senate president, Ike Ekweremadu.

When the operation failed, they turned on the whistleblower, Ahmed Echoda, and ate him raw. 

The last heard of him was when the court granted bail to the 50-year-old businessman in the sum of N500,000 after he spent some days in a dingy police cell in Abuja.

With the Whistleblower Protection Bill passed on June 8, 2017 by the Senate, though, it is hoped that whistleblowers’ full interests will be now be protected from hawks ready to pounce on the vulnerable and the naive.

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