Romanus Ugwu, Abuja and Tunde Omolehin, Sokoto
Governor of Sokoto state, Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal, has described President Muhammadu Buhari-led fight against corruption as politically motivated.
He said the Federal Government is only paying lip service to its anti-graft war, saying the president is not doing enough to build strong institutions to fight corruption.
He stated this at the signing of Memorandum of Understanding of 2019, United Nations development framework and launch of spotlight initiative between the state government and the United Nations in Sokoto.
“When I was the speaker of the Federal House of Representatives, I accused the then president, Goodluck Jonathan, who was a member of my party for supporting corruption. That is when he granted state pardon to the former Bayelsa state governor, the late DSP Alameyeiseigha, who was accused of corruption; we all known what happened after.
“Now, it is a public knowledge that the moment you align yourself with a particular political party, you are immune to the fight against corruption. We can’t get it right on the issue of fight against corruption, especially when the agencies that are assigned the task are at the mercy of the Federal Government. When they don’t like your face, they set EFCC against you. We are very much aware that once you joined a particular party, you are immune from being prosecuted by the EFCC or ICPC, that is not the way to go.
We need to stop politicising fight against corruption and take it on headlong, otherwise we won’t go anywhere.
“We knew what happened here during election, when EFCC was all over the place, arresting people anyhow, identified from them their political masters with the belief that people are buying votes.
“We know the political actors here who used EFCC as part of their campaign to come and intimidate people here. The earlier we realizes that we are not doing it right the better for the institutions to better.
“That is why during my tenure as the speaker, I spoke about it and I still want to assure you now that I am ready to support the constitutional amendments that will make our institutions strong.
“There is need to separate the office of the minister for Justice from the Attorney general of the federation. The Minister can be a politician while the Attorney General of the Federation should be above board and not a politician.
“We also need to separate the office of the Accountants General and that of the Accountant General of the Federation. We must go back to the constitution and do the right thing, if not, we may not get it right” he declared.
Meanwhile, the Zenith Labour Party (ZLP) National chairman, Dan Nwanyanwu, has promised to mobilise other political parties on the platform of the Inter Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) to pressurise President Buhari into signing the Amended Electoral Act into law.
Answering questions from newsmen after the election into IPAC executive, he assured that the political parties and other stakeholders will start early to ensure that the president does the needful.
He frowned at the current Electoral Act empowering governors into winners take all in the conduct of local government and council elections, suggesting that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) takes over the responsibility of conducting the elections.