As the battle between online news medium, Sahara Reporters and Kogi-born lawmaker, Senator Dino Melaye, gets messier by the minute, attention is now being paid to a 2008 report of the United States Department of State.
The report which was prepared by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour on March 11, 2008, summarises major issues of human rights violations in Nigeria including extra-judicial killings and unresolved murders in the year 2007.
A paragraph of the report reads:
“On August 19, Victor Obafaiye, the principal witness for the Action Congress in the Kogi State election tribunal, was assassinated. Obafaiye was crucial to the case as he was supposedly in possession of documents that would have served as evidence of election tampering by PDP House of Assembly candidate Dino Melaye.”
Melaye (APC, Kogi West) found himself on the edge of a cliff March 20, 2017 when online news medium Sahara Reporters, in a series of tweets, alleged that the rambunctious Senator did not graduate from ABU for his first degree, contrary to his claim that he studied Geography at the institution.
Furthermore, SR posited that Melaye, who is the Chairman, Senate Committee on Federal Capital Territory, bribed his Head of Department, who assisted him to forge his transcript.
Citing some lecturers at the Department of Geography, they claimed his name was not on their graduation list as he failed no fewer than five core courses.
Shortly after the damning report which quickly gained traction, Melaye dismissed the allegations, daring the news medium and the authorities to sue him on the strength of the claims.
He wrote on twitter: “Sahara Reporters, please sue me and ABU if it is true that I did not graduate from Zaria. Tell Magu (EFCC Chairman) to arrest and prosecute me.”
Days after refuting the report, Melaye, who boasted that he was currently pursuing his seventh degree, filed a N5bn defamation suit against SR, claiming he’d been traumatized by their allegation.
Documents obtained by Saturday PUNCH revealed that the beleaguered senator has a Bachelor of Arts certificate (third class) in Geography from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, alongside a diploma certificate from the University of Jos.
Curiously though, checks at the university revealed that it only offers B.Sc. Geography and not B.A. Geography as reflected on Melaye’s statement of results.
The statement of results, dated February 3, 2000, read: “This is to certify that Daniel Jonah Melaye having completed an approved course of study and passed the prescribed examinations as, under the authority of the Senate been awarded the Bachelor of Arts (Geography) with Third Class honours.”
Furthermore, his NYSC discharge certificate, issued on July 8, 2001, had his name as “Melaye Daniel” and not Daniel Jonah as shown in the statement of results.
Meanwhile, as ABU continues to stall on releasing an official statement on the issue, Harvard University has clarified that Melaye was not a graduate of the institution as he only completed a week-long leadership seminar in November 2016.
Similarly, the London School of Economics on Thursday, said there was no proof on the institution’s database that Melaye obtained any degree from the school.
Meanwhile, the embattled senator has taken to social media to exonerate himself, posting pictures of the cover and certification pages of his Master’s project, and a group picture of his days as a corps member in Kaduna.
In light of the uproar the scandal has generated, the upper chamber has decided to investigate it to a logical conclusion.
Wikipedia, meanwhile, has edited Melaye’s profile to include ‘Certificate Scandal’.
