I read Mahmud Jega’s Daily Trust column a
fortnight ago, with the title “Gra-gra versus softly-softly”. It was
composed in his characteristic meticulousness which also touched a nerve
that concerns all. It also involved me, personally. It involved me
because the piece was not only about anti-corruption struggle, something
I came to be more identified with in the course of my career, but also
because I was mentioned, or referenced to, many times in the piece. In
the piece, Jega repeated several erroneous notions about my work at the
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). But to be fair to him,
those insinuations were far from being his concoctions. They have been
held for a long time by a section of Nigerians who were largely
misinformed about the modus operandi of the EFCC I headed or about me as
a person. I therefore thought it a duty to correct some of the wrong
impressions people have about what we did, for the sake of future and
the reading public.
I must, however, appreciate many of the
positive things about our operations and modest achievements at the EFCC
highlighted by Jega. Those were things we achieved largely because of
our resolve to form a strong and professional agency, from the outset.
Strong institutions are at the base of whatever things to come out of a
system. This was a major focus for us. There were deliberate steps at
capacity building that would prove extremely advantageous for the work
we did in the five years I was there. I use “we” because the work was
never a one man job. EFCC was beyond Nuhu Ribadu, or any individual for
that matter. It was a team work. The patriotism, esprit de corp and
professionalism exhibited by the team were the secrets for our
successes.
But as I always insist, success of
anti-graft efforts is hinged largely at the leadership level, especially
the political leadership. We were lucky to have the cooperation of the
leadership at the time. To the credit of President Olusegun Obasanjo, he
let us do the work even at a time we were going against some elements
that were extremely close to him. It is therefore amusing when I hear
people these days charge me of “selective justice”. Well, perhaps those
charges could be passed as the example of what Wole Soyinka called “our
collective amnesia”. Take a comprehensive list of high profile people
EFCC brought to justice, majority of them were people that could be
correctly tagged “Obasanjo boys”. Even though some of them suddenly turn
around the moment they found themselves in trouble with the law, as a
way of buying public sympathy. Unfortunately, many people don’t strive
to stretch the facts to reveal this truth. One largely neglected pillar
of our work was the Judiciary and the criminal justice system generally.
We had the support of other people in the justice administration chain.
Without the will of incorruptible judges and other law enforcement
officials, all our modest effort would have come to nought.
However, the main thesis of Jega’s essay,
which was also made clear from the title, was that the EFCC I headed
was something of a gra-gra agency – a body that is peopled with
exuberant officers eager to arrest suspects in order to hit the
headlines. This is a flawed assessment of it. It is also something that
people come to believe, largely on account of the agency’s portrayal in
the media. EFCC was, and is, never about arrests. In fact, arrest was
just a fraction of the entire work. But because arrest is what makes the
news, the myriad of steps and processes we follow before and after
arrest are mostly overlooked.
Every step in administration of a
corruption case is carefully outlined and has its rigours and identified
procedures. A lot of work would have to be put in from the point of
accepting a petition or starting a case, analysing it, identifying the
key issues and persons, investigation, sourcing documents, obtaining
arrest and search warrants, preparing charges and then arrest. We tried
to work on each of the steps in a very meticulous manner. It is a little
surprise therefore, that throughout my period there was only one person
who took me to court challenging his detention by the EFCC. He also
lost the suit. The reason was simple: we followed the law and
therefore had to do our homework before we pick anybody. Similarly, to
point to the meticulous nature of what we did, it is in record that the
EFCC recorded a world record of over 90 percent convictions on all the
cases we prosecuted. I don’t think gra-gra would yield these results.
It is also incorrect to say that EFCC
didn’t pursue preventive measures as regards corruption. We fully
appreciated the fact that the twin strategy of prevention and
sanctioning must always go together in law enforcement in general and
fighting corruption in particular. The preventive measures of the EFCC
were often overshadowed by the news selling headlines about arrests but
EFCC took a lot of preventive measures. Major ones include the
establishment of the Training and Research Institute that has been
carrying out studies on corruption prevention in both public and private
sectors. The institute is in the lead in training of detectives, public
servants, bankers and so many others in Nigeria today. The
establishment of Financial Intelligence Unit is one of the most
important steps in preventive measures of controlling corruption
globally; EFCC has done it for Nigeria. EFCC also worked to establish
international networks and linkages, notably with the United Nations,
FBI, Metropolitan Police, German BKA, and West African
anti-money-laundering group, GIABA, among others.
We also worked closely with many
departments of governments, civil society groups, religious
organisations and schools, on public enlightenment to stem corruption in
the society. EFCC also engaged the National Assembly to amend laws, the
judiciary on corruption prevention and justice delivery, the customs,
the FIRS, NPA and many states and local governments. In fact, many of
the arrests made by EFCC arose out of whistle-blowing efforts through
these mechanisms. By the way, arrests and prosecutions are also very
powerful tools of preventive measures, because they do send a strong
message that one cannot get away with corrupt practice, no matter how
highly placed.
The article also mentioned the
impeachment of three governors allegedly influenced by the EFCC. I try
as much as possible not to be personal by commenting on such cases but
the fact that it is suddenly gaining currency, makes it only sensible to
clear the misconceptions. The EFCC did not and could not have impeached
any governor or force legislators to do so. It will be unfair to deny
the legislators the credit of doing their constitutional
responsibilities. The EFCC did its part of the responsibility of
investigation and submission of findings to the various state assemblies
all over the nation. Some state assemblies had cause to act on such
reports, others did not. But we certainly did not force anyone to take
any action. My understanding of events then was that two out of the
three former governors got arrested in London with millions of Pounds.
They absconded from justice there and that triggered chain of events
that culminated in their loss of political control of their states and
thereby resulted in their impeachments. The former governor of Ekiti
State had his own local issues. He lost out with the elite of the state,
his political party, and other stakeholders. His ordeals had nothing to
do with the EFCC. In all the cases, it was obvious that the governors
lost out with their political parties and therefore the assembly members
were more than willing to act on the thorough investigation reports of
the EFCC. The reports were the extent of EFCC’s involvement in those
impeachments.
As a proviso, I want to state that all
the actions we took while at the EFCC were taken with the purest of
intentions and based on available facts before us at the time. But it is
understandable that in everything we do as humans, we are bound to be
misunderstood. However, fear of being misunderstood should not be an
excuse for not moving to salvage our country. As citizens, we all have
the civic responsibility of playing our part in healing the country of
its myriad of maladies and guiding it to the coast of prosperity.
• Ribadu is the former EFCC chairman
No comments:
Post a Comment