From: James Ojo, Abuja
Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Financial Crimes, Hon Kayode Oladele, on Tuesday, faulted the war against corruption of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), saying that the commission was only fighting war against money laundering.
He told the first National Anti-Corruption Stakeholders’ Summit, with the theme, “Building National Anti-Corruption Consensus in a Multi-Agency Environment”, organised by the EFCC that indeed there was no war against corruption in the country.
But the acting chairman of EFCC, Ibrahim Magu disagreed with him, saying that the commission was totally committed to the war against economic and financial crimes, including corruption, in the country and was making steady progress with more conviction, arrest and prosecution
Oladele submitted what the anti-corruption commission was currently doing was only to investigate and prosecute, adding that the body was prosecuting money laundering, an aspect of corruption, as there was never any efforts by the anti-graft agency to change the minds of Nigerians, adding that the problem with the country was not corruption but impunity.
“If we want to fight corruption and change the the system, we have to change the value system. The problem with Nigeria is not corruption but impunity. Nigerians have to stop buck passing and personal responsibility,” Hon. Oladele stated.
He however made a strong case for the wellbeing of the staff of EFCC with a view to encouraging them to wag war against corruption without any hindrance, submitting that the bureaucratic bottleneck of the police should not be imposed on the EFCC.
He assured that the National Assembly would ensure improved budgetary allocation for EFCC in order for it to be well positioned to tackle corruption on all fronts.
Speaking earlier, the Chairman, Senate Committee on Anti-Corruption and Financial Crimes, Senator Chukwuka Utazi, stated that concerted efforts had to be made to push corruption out of the polity in the country.
According to him, the central role corruption had played in the lack of any appreciable progress on all indices of development and in the inability of successive governments in providing the basic needs of life for Nigerians populace and competing with its peers in the comity of nations was the main reason the people had to engage in consistent, habitual discussions on the subject of corruption.
“The rot engendered by corruption is such that public officers who did not use their position to corruptly enrich themselves and gain advantage for their cronies are regarded as failures and laggards who do not want others to benefit from them. It has become a burden weighing on the nation,” Utazi stated.
While noting that the war against corruption should be waged with strategies more than brawn, Utazi stated that EFCC should have competent professionals manning its various departments, adding that the practice of secondment from organisations, except people who were bringing uncommon technical competence, should be discouraged.
“The constitution guarantees the right to fair hearing and to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. Media trials tend to antagonise these rights. While we must fight corruption to a standstill, we must countenance the tenets of fairness.
In his opening remarks, Magu stated that Nigeria was at a critical phase in its evolution as a nation, adding that corruption had been identified as the greatest challenge undermining its development.
“This diagnosis is actually not new. What we have lacked in the past is the commitment to make a difference. I believe that we are uniquely placed to change the narrative as far as the fight against corruption in Nigeria is concerned.”
He assured that the anti-corruption commission was totally committed to the war against corruption, declaring that Nigerians had suffered for too long to be abandoned to the cruel fate imposed by crooks and thieves.
“For us at EFCC, I can tell you without fear of contradiction, that we are totally committed to the war against economic and financial crimes, including corruption. Our people have suffered for too long to be abandoned to the cruel fate imposed by crooks and thieves,” Magu said.
On a personal level, the acting chairman further stated that, “I am irrevocably committed to leading the young men and women of the commission in taking the fight to the doorsteps of those who have looted the treasury and mortgaged our common patrimony.”
He, however, declared that no effort would be spared in ensuring that every kobo illegally taken from the people’s commonwealth would be recovered and returned to the treasury.
“There will be no hiding places as every kobo taken illegally from the treasury would be traced, recovered and returned,” the anti-corruption Czar assured.
Magu submitted that the summit was imperative as for a long time the various anti-corruption agencies in the country had encased in individual silos, often taken separate and sometimes conflicting paths on the road to liberating Nigeria from the stranglehold of corruption.