The National President of the Association of Nigerian Authors, ANA, Denja Abdullahi has reacted to a claim by one of the presidential aspirants of the association, Ahmed Maiwada, that some portions of the land belonging to the association at Mpape – Abuja were misappropriated.
DAILY NIGERIAN recalls that during his declaration speech on Thursday in Abuja, Mr Maiwada suggested that some portions of the land were misappropriated due to mismanagement by the leadership of the association.
Mr Maiwada lamented that he laboured to reclaim back ANA land from a land-grabber developer but were ostracised from being a party to how such land is being utilised.
He said: “Imagine yourself as that who eventually won the court case for your association, thinking that, now the entire members of your association would benefit from that land.
“Imagine the rude shock at realising that the size of the land on paper, which you have recovered, was reduced by about half while you had been in court fighting.
“I want you to put yourself in the shoes of that lawyer: see yourself, soon after finishing the four-year-long and energy-sapping litigation for your dear association, seeing other people apart from the developer you have defeated in court, rising up to lay claim that even that half-land that you have recovered had been sold to them and therefore your association had nothing there to lay claim on.
“Imagine you are that lawyer, left with no choice than return to court and continue fighting, most times all alone, for the next six years, in order to finally secure title for your association and thereby guarantee the full security of the land you have recovered during the initial four years of your battle in court.
“Imagine yourself in the shoes of that lawyer – your only reason for putting up those years of battle and stiff resistance against those seeking to take away the land belonging to your dear association being that all the other members of the association might eat from the fat of that land you have recovered, without discrimination against anybody on the basis of ethnicity, religion or membership status in the association.
“Imagine that you are such a lawyer who have, in the course of those ten solid years of legal battles, rejected overtures to compromise the trust that your association has vested in you by some of those seeking to take away the land.
“Imagine that after all this sacrifice you have made for the association and the members of the association, you are expected to not be interested in how the said land is eventually administered and that proceeds of the investments made on it are fully accounted for and equitably distributed among all members of the association, through its Chapters all over the country,” Mr Maiwada noted.
However, in his swift reaction through a telephone interview with DAILY NIGERIAN correspondent, the incumbent president of the association refuted Mr Maiwada’s claim, saying that no potion of ANA land was lost or sold out indiscriminately.
He, however, recalled that, “the case that took us to court was a case of a breach of contract by the developer whom we gave the land to develop. We, thereafter, reclaimed our land and terminated his contract.”
“Why, then, is he claiming to have recovered the land for us? I can prove it with documents and files of judgement that was given.
Mr Abdullahi, therefore, challenged Mr Maiwada to put forward pieces of evidence to back up his assertions.
“Let him produce the court judgement and show us where ANA land was sold or lost,” Mr Abdullahi stated.
Speaking on Mr Maiwada’s claim of pro bono legal services to the association, Mr Abdullahi stated that Mr Maiwada was engaged as a counsel to ANA land and was accordingly paid for his service.
He said: “To be specific, Maiwada was paid five million naira for the legal services he rendered.
“Secondly, I was in court with him for that four years. He never went to court for one day without me.
“As I speak with you Maiwada is not a Counsel to ANA. He has written a letter to say that he will no longer represent ANA in any of its cases.
“He claimed that we have not paid him some money and all that. So, if he goes around claiming that he represents ANA, he is only lying,” Mr Abdullahi asserted.
