March 14, 2010
Exposing the high profile deceit and conscious ineptitude of the current leadership of the nation’s anti-graft agency, The Office of the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, actually spoke the minds of most concerned Nigerians
when in its 2009 annual report it said the nation’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) under the current leadership, is not sincere in the fight against the endemic corruption at all tiers of government.
According to the report, “the EFCC's anti-corruption efforts were largely ineffectual. Despite the arrest of several high-ranking officials by the EFCC, there were allegations that agency investigations targeted individuals who were out of favor with the government of the day, while those that were in favor continued their activities with impunity.”
The current pathetic state of affairs in the nation’s anti-graft war was foreseen and alarm raised the moment Mrs Farida Waziri was brought in by the now exiled former Attorney General of the Federation, Chief Michael Aondoakaa. And true to the expressed fears of skeptics, the achievements of Waziri’s EFCC in the areas of investigation and prosecution of cases could best be adjudged as blurred and at worst obscured.
Nigerians especially the battered and terribly robbed people of the Niger Delta are still waiting to see just one serious case handled and clearly concluded. The people are still waiting to see the EFCC retrieve and return stolen monies even a part of it back to the respective states’ and local governments’ coffers. But this seems to be a mirage thus far as most of the cases involving serving and former government officials of the Niger Delta states have either been deliberately bungled by the agency or pathetically on hold.
The anti-graft agency’s failure to fight corruption has severally been blamed for the glaring backwardness and development imbalance of the entire Niger Delta region despite the huge monthly allocations and internally generated revenues that are the envy of states in other regions.
On November 11 2009, security operatives at the General Aviation Terminal of the Murtala Muhammed Airport, Lagos arrested one Mrs Emem Etuk with $3.1 million allegedly belonging to the Akwa Ibom State Governor, , Chief Godswill Akpabio.
Despite the public outcry and call for immediate investigation, the EFCC said the matter was a police affair and the Commission would not ‘meddle’ in it. So whose domain does such a clear case of money laundering falls? The police, on the other hand, have refused to make any public statement on the incident while the ICPC has pretended as if ‘nothing spoil’. Monkey deh work, baboon de chop!
Duly channeled allegations (petitions) against the Bayelsa state governor, Timi Sylva are with the EFCC, yet nothing has ever been said to the man by the agency. Oh! Sorry, he is still enjoying diplomatic immunity abi?
What of the cases of Ex-Governors Victor Attah, Lucky Igbinedion, Peter Odili and a one –time NNDC strongman, Timi Alaibe?
Attah issued a statement recently saying he has been cleared by EFCC. Of course Niger Delta people were not surprised as they have come to know that the EFCC, from its track records of cases in the region, have shown that it can issue such clearance no matter the strength of the evidence in any petition.
Meanwhile Peter Odili is still enjoying the eternal ‘beware of dogs’ perpetual injunctions restraining the agency from arresting, detaining and arraigning him on the basis of investigation of his tenure as governor of Rivers state.
And borrowing from the success of Odili’s judicial manipulation, Nyesom Nwike, Governor Amaechi’s Chief of Staff who was accused of corruption and money peddling also ran to the court in Port Harcourt to secure another perpetual injunction restraining the EFCC from further investigations, arrest or prosecuting him.
So the two cases involving Rivers state government have been put on permanent hold and nobody is saying anything about it.
By all indication, the EFCC and unsurprisingly the then Attorney General of the Federation (who also superintended the EFCC) failed to appeal the judgment or rather neglected the urgency or maybe outrightly abandoned any appeal to vacate such mischievous perpetual injunctions.
Truth be told, the fact that these injunctions remain subsisting is an indisputable indictment against the EFCC leadership.
What of the case of James Ibori? The American anti-graft report even specifically cited it as one notable instance of EFCC’s insincerity: “In December the judge dismissed the 170 counts of illegal activity against former Delta State Governor James Ibori, although the judge ordered a retrial. Ibori remained free on bail at year's (2009) end.” The EFCC equally vowed to appeal the case and severally months have passed and nothing has happened either to retry the caseor appeal the ruling.
Now that Chief Edwin Clark amongst other elders of Delta state have again petitioned the EFCC on Ibori’s tenure as governor of Delta state, it will be interesting to hear what the commission will give as excuse for failure to do the right thing this time. Before, the commission’s failures were heaped on Aondoakaa’s unholy meddling in the operations of the agency. Now we have a new Attorney General and a new acting president.
What happened in the former Edo State Governor, Lucky Igbinedion’s case against whom the EFCC was supposed to be appealing a December 2008 verdict due to the light sentence he received for the alleged embezzlement of more than N3.6 billion (approximately $24 million)?
The court ruling on Igbinedion’s case could best be considered a slap on the face of the people of Edo State. But the EFCC boss in her characteristics manner tried to shift the blame again to the court. This was her story, an extract from the interview she granted to a Nigerian US-based online publication:
“When Lucky Igbinedion’s lawyer came to discuss with our own lawyers about plea bargaining, that he wanted to return some of the looted funds, we agreed, we worked together; he forfeited some things like money, houses and companies in Edo, Lagos and Abuja.
“But when we got to the court, the shock was from the courts because instead of the sentence as it was agreed, they (court) gave him an option of fine, I think it was N3.5million; he brought the money from (his pocket) the boot of his car and paid there and then.”
Meanwhile, it is on good record that most of the former governors entered plea bargains with the EFCC and the Yar’adua Presidency and agreed to return part of the monies they looted from the public coffers but how this deal was negotiated and executed still remains blurred.
Like the cases involving Niger Delta government officials (former and serving), the people want to know how much each of those officials agreed that they looted, how much they agreed to returned, how much they actually returned and what percentage of the loot was returned. These are areas where the EFCC would have doused the Nigerians’ fear that officials of the agency may have been involved in sharing the looted funds. The EFCC may still need to do this to help the public have a clearer picture of this ‘you bee thief I no bee thief’ operation of the agency.
While Mrs Waziri's feigned exasperation with the often frivolous interlocutory injunctions given by judges to stall EFCC’s cases in prosecuting corrupt government officials may deceive some Nigerians, obviously, majority of the citizenry are tired of these escapist explanations. This is not to deny, however, that a change of attitude by the judiciary would be a boost to the EFCC's effectiveness. A situation where a Nigerian judge can grant an order of perpetual injunction restraining the EFCC from investigating or arresting a suspect is nothing short of sabotage against our collective interest and should be resisted at all cost.
We are fully aware that some members of the judiciary are working against the success of the anti-corruption campaign in the country. It is also on record that, Mrs Waziri had severally accused her colleagues in the law profession of sharing the stolen billions from corrupt public officials in the name of professional fees.
But how long would the EFCC just sit back and blame every other institution but itself for the glaring failures to carry out its statutory mandates? What is the essence of the agency if all we hear from it are tales of handicaps and sabotage? Madam, act now and retrieve and return to us our looted monies. Period!
IFEANYI IZEZE IS AN ABUJA-BASED CONSULTANT ON STRATEGY AND COMMUNICATIONS ([email protected])
when in its 2009 annual report it said the nation’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) under the current leadership, is not sincere in the fight against the endemic corruption at all tiers of government.
According to the report, “the EFCC's anti-corruption efforts were largely ineffectual. Despite the arrest of several high-ranking officials by the EFCC, there were allegations that agency investigations targeted individuals who were out of favor with the government of the day, while those that were in favor continued their activities with impunity.”
The current pathetic state of affairs in the nation’s anti-graft war was foreseen and alarm raised the moment Mrs Farida Waziri was brought in by the now exiled former Attorney General of the Federation, Chief Michael Aondoakaa. And true to the expressed fears of skeptics, the achievements of Waziri’s EFCC in the areas of investigation and prosecution of cases could best be adjudged as blurred and at worst obscured.
Nigerians especially the battered and terribly robbed people of the Niger Delta are still waiting to see just one serious case handled and clearly concluded. The people are still waiting to see the EFCC retrieve and return stolen monies even a part of it back to the respective states’ and local governments’ coffers. But this seems to be a mirage thus far as most of the cases involving serving and former government officials of the Niger Delta states have either been deliberately bungled by the agency or pathetically on hold.
The anti-graft agency’s failure to fight corruption has severally been blamed for the glaring backwardness and development imbalance of the entire Niger Delta region despite the huge monthly allocations and internally generated revenues that are the envy of states in other regions.
On November 11 2009, security operatives at the General Aviation Terminal of the Murtala Muhammed Airport, Lagos arrested one Mrs Emem Etuk with $3.1 million allegedly belonging to the Akwa Ibom State Governor, , Chief Godswill Akpabio.
Despite the public outcry and call for immediate investigation, the EFCC said the matter was a police affair and the Commission would not ‘meddle’ in it. So whose domain does such a clear case of money laundering falls? The police, on the other hand, have refused to make any public statement on the incident while the ICPC has pretended as if ‘nothing spoil’. Monkey deh work, baboon de chop!
Duly channeled allegations (petitions) against the Bayelsa state governor, Timi Sylva are with the EFCC, yet nothing has ever been said to the man by the agency. Oh! Sorry, he is still enjoying diplomatic immunity abi?
What of the cases of Ex-Governors Victor Attah, Lucky Igbinedion, Peter Odili and a one –time NNDC strongman, Timi Alaibe?
Attah issued a statement recently saying he has been cleared by EFCC. Of course Niger Delta people were not surprised as they have come to know that the EFCC, from its track records of cases in the region, have shown that it can issue such clearance no matter the strength of the evidence in any petition.
Meanwhile Peter Odili is still enjoying the eternal ‘beware of dogs’ perpetual injunctions restraining the agency from arresting, detaining and arraigning him on the basis of investigation of his tenure as governor of Rivers state.
And borrowing from the success of Odili’s judicial manipulation, Nyesom Nwike, Governor Amaechi’s Chief of Staff who was accused of corruption and money peddling also ran to the court in Port Harcourt to secure another perpetual injunction restraining the EFCC from further investigations, arrest or prosecuting him.
So the two cases involving Rivers state government have been put on permanent hold and nobody is saying anything about it.
By all indication, the EFCC and unsurprisingly the then Attorney General of the Federation (who also superintended the EFCC) failed to appeal the judgment or rather neglected the urgency or maybe outrightly abandoned any appeal to vacate such mischievous perpetual injunctions.
Truth be told, the fact that these injunctions remain subsisting is an indisputable indictment against the EFCC leadership.
What of the case of James Ibori? The American anti-graft report even specifically cited it as one notable instance of EFCC’s insincerity: “In December the judge dismissed the 170 counts of illegal activity against former Delta State Governor James Ibori, although the judge ordered a retrial. Ibori remained free on bail at year's (2009) end.” The EFCC equally vowed to appeal the case and severally months have passed and nothing has happened either to retry the caseor appeal the ruling.
Now that Chief Edwin Clark amongst other elders of Delta state have again petitioned the EFCC on Ibori’s tenure as governor of Delta state, it will be interesting to hear what the commission will give as excuse for failure to do the right thing this time. Before, the commission’s failures were heaped on Aondoakaa’s unholy meddling in the operations of the agency. Now we have a new Attorney General and a new acting president.
What happened in the former Edo State Governor, Lucky Igbinedion’s case against whom the EFCC was supposed to be appealing a December 2008 verdict due to the light sentence he received for the alleged embezzlement of more than N3.6 billion (approximately $24 million)?
The court ruling on Igbinedion’s case could best be considered a slap on the face of the people of Edo State. But the EFCC boss in her characteristics manner tried to shift the blame again to the court. This was her story, an extract from the interview she granted to a Nigerian US-based online publication:
“When Lucky Igbinedion’s lawyer came to discuss with our own lawyers about plea bargaining, that he wanted to return some of the looted funds, we agreed, we worked together; he forfeited some things like money, houses and companies in Edo, Lagos and Abuja.
“But when we got to the court, the shock was from the courts because instead of the sentence as it was agreed, they (court) gave him an option of fine, I think it was N3.5million; he brought the money from (his pocket) the boot of his car and paid there and then.”
Meanwhile, it is on good record that most of the former governors entered plea bargains with the EFCC and the Yar’adua Presidency and agreed to return part of the monies they looted from the public coffers but how this deal was negotiated and executed still remains blurred.
Like the cases involving Niger Delta government officials (former and serving), the people want to know how much each of those officials agreed that they looted, how much they agreed to returned, how much they actually returned and what percentage of the loot was returned. These are areas where the EFCC would have doused the Nigerians’ fear that officials of the agency may have been involved in sharing the looted funds. The EFCC may still need to do this to help the public have a clearer picture of this ‘you bee thief I no bee thief’ operation of the agency.
While Mrs Waziri's feigned exasperation with the often frivolous interlocutory injunctions given by judges to stall EFCC’s cases in prosecuting corrupt government officials may deceive some Nigerians, obviously, majority of the citizenry are tired of these escapist explanations. This is not to deny, however, that a change of attitude by the judiciary would be a boost to the EFCC's effectiveness. A situation where a Nigerian judge can grant an order of perpetual injunction restraining the EFCC from investigating or arresting a suspect is nothing short of sabotage against our collective interest and should be resisted at all cost.
We are fully aware that some members of the judiciary are working against the success of the anti-corruption campaign in the country. It is also on record that, Mrs Waziri had severally accused her colleagues in the law profession of sharing the stolen billions from corrupt public officials in the name of professional fees.
But how long would the EFCC just sit back and blame every other institution but itself for the glaring failures to carry out its statutory mandates? What is the essence of the agency if all we hear from it are tales of handicaps and sabotage? Madam, act now and retrieve and return to us our looted monies. Period!
IFEANYI IZEZE IS AN ABUJA-BASED CONSULTANT ON STRATEGY AND COMMUNICATIONS ([email protected])
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