The Metamorphosis Of Nuhu Mallam Ribadu

 By Dr Ugoji Egbujo

Born in 1960, Nuhu Ribadu, perhaps, had independence in his genes. Son of a first republic parliamentarian from Yola, Nuhu came with a good  spoon in his mouth.

*Ribadu 
After he studied law, he  joined the police,  climbing  the career ladder of a corrupt and disoriented institution. Young  Ribadu, it appeared, resisted the mind bending culture and stored a grudge for filth. But cynics saw a temperamental, conceited, attention-seeking, power-hungry, and callow fellow.  In 2003, after glimpses of promise at the department of prosecution, Nuhu arrived on the national stage. 

How Long Will Yahaya Bello Continue With This Lawless Act?

 By Richards Ibe

The ex-Governor of Kogi State, Yahaya Bello, who handed over to the current governor of the state, Usman Ododo in January this year after his two terms of four-years-tenure, has consistently been in the news in the past eight months.

*Bello and others dancing on the road...

It has been from one drama to the other bordering on his stewardship and how he handled the affairs of the state under his tenure.

Bello, who was alleged to have defrauded the state to the tune of N84 billion during his tenure, have done everything in and out of the books to avoid his trial spearheaded by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

Tinubu Must Find Dollars NOT Scapegoats!

 By Ugoji Egbujo

If they leave the major bleeding points oozing to fan the man because he is sweating, then they are like our government that has left crude oil thieves to chase BDC operators.

The country is in shock. Shock is what happens when circulation fails and systems start to shut down. Our country lies prostrate, bleating, like a man run over by a hit-and-run truck. Our foreign reserves are empty. The poor can’t buy food. The government is running helter-skelter to pander to the angry masses and save itself. Truth has been sacrificed. But that won’t do. So, scapegoats must be found. Perhaps, as the Igbo say, a desperate man is entitled to act a little crazy.  

Toothless Bulldog: Tinubu’s EFCC Can’t Fight Corruption

 By Olu Fasan

Ola Olukoyede, the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, recently appointed by Nigeria’s new president, Bola Tinubu, is saying the right things and making the right noises about fighting corruption in Nigeria. Recently, he struck a chord with me when he called for unexplained wealth legislation in Nigeria.

*Ola Olukoyede

Unexplained wealth laws are the most powerful tool for tackling corruption, as I wrote in a piece titled: “Fighting corruption? Nigeria must tackle unexplained wealth” (Vanguard, November 22, 2021). Yet, despite my positive opinion of the new EFCC chairman, the stark reality is that the EFCC won’t and can’t make an iota of difference in stemming the inexorable rise of corruption in Nigeria. The agency is so bedevilled that it has become part of the problem, not part of the solution.

Betta Edu: Why Ministers Abuse Public Office In Nigeria

 By Olu Fasan

Few things confer greater honour and privilege than being a minister in the government of one’s country. From a wider population, you are one of the select few called upon to run your nation. But a ministerial office is not a source of personal wealth, power or prestige.

*Betta Edu and Tinubu

Rather, it’s a call to service, an opportunity to use your talent to advance your nation’s progress and the wellbeing of its people.

Therefore, it’s an unpardonable betrayal for any minister or officeholder to abuse his or her office and put private gain above public good. Sadly, in Nigeria, private gain triumphs over public good. 

Nigeria: Remove The Absurdities Not The Subsidies

 By Ige Asemudara

Successive Nigerian governments have proven irresponsible and largely insensitive to the suffering of the people. In its few weeks of mounting the power rostrum, the Tinubu administration has not evinced any exceptional trait that can trigger a perception that there will be a difference. Its starting point of glibly pronouncing that “subsidy is gone” without any thorough ideological – especially social and economical – evaluation is the barest slap planted on the faces of suffering Nigerians in recent time. 

It beats one hollow to fathom that this administration would accept to implement a policy conceived by an economic novice as the Buhari regime which lacked the tact, faith, courage or conviction to remove subsidy in its eight years of woeful hold on the nation. It does sound like eating hemlock for another person’s suicide mission.

The Bulkachuwalisation Of The Judiciary

 By Ugoji Egbujo

It wasn’t a Freudian slip. The man couldn’t be stopped. An 83-year-old senator, seized by valedictory emotions, stood in the hallowed senate chambers and broke omerta. Defying the bulging eyes of bewildered senators, he told a dirty truth to the nation. All attempts by his distinguished colleagues to extinguish the flame of forthrightness were rebuffed by the courageous man.

The man thanked his wife, a former President of the Court of Appeal for allowing him to use her to pervert justice in favour of his colleagues. Gratitude is a virtue. As the cringing distinguished beneficiaries of the rotten judicial porridge pinched their noses like Pharisees and gasped in shock, the man gushed over his caring and generous wife who had helped him cook judicial outcomes.  

Corruption: EFCC Is Not Fit For Purpose; It’s Time To Scrap It!

 By Olu Fasan

When General Olusegun Obasanjo became president in 1999, he was under pressure from the international community to tackle corruption frontally. Obasanjo himself described corruption in Nigeria as cancerous, saying it required surgical operations. He established an anti-corruption agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, in 2003.

But 20 years later, Nigeria remains a “fantastically corrupt country” as a former British prime minister memorably put it. The cancer of corruption has festered and spread malignantly, destroying every facet of Nigeria’s polity.

When A Leader Is Demystified In Power

By Okey Ndiribe

A recent attack on President Muhammadu Buhari’s convoy in Kano is a clear sign of rejection by the youths of the ancient city. Coming shortly after a similar incident in his home state of Katsina, it sends a signal of regional resentment against a leader who enjoyed a massive personality cult-following at the beginning of his  tenure eight years ago. 

These seeming acts of rebellion on the part of a once docile populace -which gave him over 12 million votes during the 2015 presidential election-appear to be a direct response to the President’s recent self-award of a pass mark to his administration. Buhari’s remark which was made in Bauchi had elicited a huge controversy among Nigerians. One had thought that was the end of the matter.

We Need Change Of Tactics In The Anti-Graft War

 By Dan Agbese

It would be uncharitable to suggest that successive Nigerian leaders have spoken from both sides of the mouth in tackling corruption in the land. Dem don try. It would be naïve, of course, for anyone to suggest that the longest running war in the land has either been won or there are prospects it will sooner than later. The fact is that corruption is at an all-time high. President Muhammadu Buhari is unable to kill it. It is killing Nigeria.

There is a need to change tactics in prosecuting the anti-graft war for purposes of obtaining better results. Corruption will not end but it should be possible not to make it a way of life in the country. We have used probe panels to unearth the corrupt in our public services; the landed and other properties of the guilty were confiscated to deny them the right to enjoy the fruits of their corruption. But the corruption grows stronger.

Allen Onyema And Air Peace V. US Department of Justice: Points To Ponder

By Emmanuel N. Emenyonu, Ph.D (Glasgow), LLB (London), CPA (Massachusetts), FCA (Nigeria)

------------------------------------------

"The Nigerian media space went agog when the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia Atlanta Division on November 19, 2019, filed Case 1:19-cr-00464, A “True Bill”, otherwise known as Grand Jury Criminal Indictment against the persons of Allen Ifechukwu Athan Onyema, a Nigerian Citizen, the Chairman and CEO of Air Peace; and Ejiroghene Eghagha, a Nigerian citizen and the Chief of Administration and Finance of Air Peace. Commentators have speculated on the guilt or innocence of the accused.

*Allen Onyeama

Others have offered some theories relating to the motivations and hidden hands behind the Indictment. Some ‘experts’ have pontificated on the seriousness of the charges especially money laundering. Some commentators have even likened the Indictment to some recent high profile indictments involving some Nigerians alleged to have engaged in sundry cybercrimes and advanced fee fraud schemes.

Nigeria: Reducing The Cost Of Governance

By Anthony Akinola

Agitation or call for a reduction in the cost of governance has been rather perennial. I wrote on this very topic sometime in the 1980s for the London-based West Africa magazine. I had then called for a reduction in the number of senatorial seats per state, which then was five. I had also called for a reduction in the number of ministers and advisers-all these in the Nigerian Second Republic.

*President Buhari and Senate President Lawan

I would later follow up this discussion with a memorandum to the Ibrahim Babangida-led Armed Forces Ruling Council (AFRC), sometime in 1986, in which I suggested that senatorial constituencies could be limited to what is now 3 Senators per state. 

Fighting Corruption: Time For Nigeria To Take The Gloves Off

By Chris Douglas

Nigeria is making significant inroads into the fight against corruption. Charges are being brought against people in Nigeria for corruption and fraud allowing significant amounts of cash to be recovered. And the country has achieved some success in recovering the proceeds of corruption laundered offshore, notably the return of US$700 million by Switzerland.

President Buhari 

But not every country is cooperating. As an Australian Federal Police officer, I have experienced the frustration of attempting to recover the proceeds of crime earned in Australia and laundered overseas. Recovering the proceeds of crime in other countries involves a minefield of legal, logistical and financial issues. However, the chances of success can be increased by undertaking a thorough criminal investigation in country, having local money laundering laws that are robust and which have extra territorial reach, and by the appropriate use of informal and formal asset recovery arrangements.

Nigeria: Mystery Snake And A Nation’s Comedy Of Errors

By Tayo Ogunbiyi

The Comedy of Errors is one of William Shakespeare’s early plays. It is his shortest and one of his most farcical comedies, with a major part of the humour coming from slapstick and mistaken identity, in addition to puns and word play.

The play tells the story of two sets of identical twins that were accidentally separated at birth but were eventually united after a series of witty events.

Today, the phrase ‘a comedy of errors’ is often used to describe a situation that is so full of mistakes and problems that it seems funny. On that premise, it won’t be out of place to tag our nation as a Land of Comedy of Errors.  Things happen in our clime that you cannot but remember the famous Charley Boy Show where anything can happen.  

A New Role For Magu

By Paul Onomuakpokpo

In a democratic government that is marked by the absence of an autocratic pecking order that harks back to the days of medieval despots, conflicts among the key players in the political space are inevitable. But since there is no allowance for any of the three arms of government to hegemonise authority, they are all expected to adhere to a constitutionally ratified cooperative principle that oils the wheel of good governance.

*Ibrahim Magu

Such a principle is violated if instead of the arms of government mustering enough capacity to resolve their disagreements, they allow them to hurt governance. This brings us to the long-drawn rift between the Presidency and the Senate over the confirmation of the Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu. The conflict is festering as both arms of government continue to maintain their hardline positions.

The Senate has vowed not to confirm any presidential nominee until Magu is relieved of his job. It feels affronted by the unresolved contradiction that the same Presidency that gleefully declared that it did not need the approval of the Senate for Magu to be in office wants the upper legislative chamber to confirm presidential nominees. 

In its attempt to wriggle out of the cul-de-sac it has found itself, the Presidency is considering taking the matter to the Supreme Court for judicial intervention. When the rift between the two arms began, the Presidency obviously relished the support of the public. The latter eagerly waited for that moment when the Senate would declare itself shellacked by the Presidency. Beyond supinely contemplating the impudence of the Senate to appropriate powers it has not been given by the constitution, some people made themselves available to be hired to protest against the chamber. But these protests have since fizzled out since it has become clear that the Senate would not disavow its position.

Nigeria: Perils Of Looters’ Anonymity

By Paul Onomuakpokpo 

It is a disturbing paradox that the Ibrahim Magu’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has left unresolved – the more breathtaking the speed with which it pursues its campaign of ridding the country of corruption, the more chinks are inflicted on its armour for sceptics to question its credibility. Just recently, the Department of State Services (DSS) and the Senate attempted to nibble away at the confidence of Magu by directly impugning his competence and integrity. Worse, the commission has been woefully losing its cases in the courts.

(pix: NigerianEcho)

The above could be considered as externally induced bumps in the path of the commission to wage a successful war against corruption. But there are other obstacles that the agency has seemingly spawned deliberately to serve a purpose other than its avowed pursuit of national good. The newest obstacle that the EFCC is now erecting in its path is its declaration of its inability to identify the owners of loot it has recovered.

By taking this path, the agency has failed to realise that it has set up itself for mockery. For the EFCC’s declaration is a self-indictment as it means that it has failed to do the first things before rushing to the media to announce its haul to its excited audience that cheers it on. It has failed to do a thorough surveillance and investigation that could have made it to unveil the identities of the culprits and render its case irreproachable. It is this unbroken absence of fidelity to the first things that have made the courts to dismiss most of the cases of the EFCC.

 As the controversy rages over the N15 billion cash haul from the Osborne Towers’ raid, we must not really be shocked by the EFCC consigning the owners of the loot to the zone of anonymity. This is because this position of the agency is only a new dimension to the byzantine character of the campaign that has the rapturous blessing of the government beginning with President Muhammadu Buhari. Remember, it was Buhari who offered to the public the prospect of waging an anti-corruption war that knows neither friend nor foe.

Whistleblowing, New Profession?

By Ben Okezie

As a junior crime reporter working with the defunct National Concord Newspaper in the 1980s, I was posted to the police and other security agencies beat. While on the beat, I came across a man whose only job was to extract information about criminals, especially robbers, in Lagos metropolis. He was well known among senior police officers and he was referred to as an “Informant.”

His job was to collate information from robbers, their operational hide-outs and, possibly, their next target. Such information was passed to the state Commissioner of Police and he was adequately  rewarded financially. I gathered that, whenever the police were auctioning recovered vehicles, he was always considered. However, the story changed when one of the robbery gangs received information about his activities with the police; he was trailed to his house in Ajegunle and shot dead before his neighbours. The police never disclosed the story to journalists but investigations revealed the incident.

Informants of those days were rough-looking, some of them turned out to be disenchanted members of robbery gangs. Their reports were mainly to expose robbers for easy apprehension and prosecution, but things have changed, the world has evolved and corruption has taken a devastating stand. This was not the situation prior to Independence.

The Tragedy Of A Presidential Illness

By Dan Agbese

President Muhammadu Buhari is back home and is now at work in Aso Rock. That sentence, a poor reportage of stale news, speaks to our collective relief at seeing the president as usual resplendent in his white baban riga, at his desk.

The enormous relief at his return is still washing over the nation. He was away for 50 days. And for 50 days, this nation was on tenterhooks, consumed by fear, concern and anxiety. And hope was progressively marginalised. Presidential spokesmen positively muddied the waters when they unnecessarily tried quite gallantly but pathetically vainly to deny what was patently undeniable: the fact of the president’s illness.

I join millions of my compatriots in welcoming Buhari back home. It is the Lord’s doing. Or, perhaps, more appropriately in this case, it is Allah’s doing. 

It should not be difficult for Buhari to pick up from where he left off more than 50 days ago as of this writing. He is lucky to have a vice-president who is committed to the ideals of governance they share and did a splendid job of minding the complicated shop by the name of Nigeria. His administration remains on course. Splendid.

The president’s illness was a sad and cruel reminder that illness is no respecter of persons. All mortals, presidents and truck pushers alike, are subject to the grim decision of the Grim Reaper entirely at its own discretion. The president is human; so is the truck pusher. I see the president’s illness as an interruption on his programme of salvaging the country. It shook the nation as much as it shook his own immediate family. Pox on illness.

The Politics Of Ibrahim Magu’s Confirmation

 By Godwin Onyeacholem

 Following an initial setback caused by a purported security report on which the senate relied for suspending Ibrahim Magu’s confirmation as the substantive chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), President Muhammadu Buhari has rightly written back to the senate requesting Magu’s confirmation, having been convinced of the futility of the so-called report prepared by the Department of State Services (DSS).

*Magu

Besides succumbing to wise counsel, Buhari’s decision aligns with the popular expectation of a great majority of the people who want to see Magu continue the excellent job he is doing in his acting role at the helm of the country’s foremost anti-corruption agency. Indeed, the voice for his retention has been so resounding that were Nigerians to cast a ballot regarding his continuation, the result would be returned overwhelmingly in his favour.

Yet, for him and the success of the anti-corruption campaign, the senate hurdle remains an albatross. Despite Buhari’s letter reiterating the crucial importance of checking the corruption scourge and appealing for a favourable acceptance of this nominee in view of the need to sustain the prevailing momentum and capacity of the EFCC, the body language of the senators is decidedly against this sentiment.

It does not matter to them that apart from the high integrity quotient of Buhari, their party’s and indeed Buhari’s flagship campaign promise of a frontal fight against corruption was the other major reason Nigerians voted massively for the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 2015 presidential election. Nor do they feel embarrassed that despite belonging to the same APC party as President Buhari and being the majority in the upper parliament, APC senators are unable to muster the required insight and unity of purpose that would lead to a seamless confirmation of Buhari’s nominee as head of a strategic agency primed to actualize a top agenda in their party’s manifesto.

Understandably, some of them, including opposition PDP senators, are already being vigorously prosecuted for all manner of crimes by the EFCC. Thus, to them the nominee represents a creeping affliction that would effectively checkmate not just their own relentless pursuit of unconscionable excesses, but also that of similar selfish elite groups that have conspired to hold down the development of this country. Therefore, the chairman of EFCC can and should be anyone else but Magu, they must have resolved.

Alleged Corruption: How Not To Save Magu

By Paul Onomuakpokpo

Those who really want President Muhammadu Buhari to succeed in his campaign against corruption must be scandalised by the efforts of his so-called supporters to persuade him to dismiss the allegations of corruption against Ibrahim Magu as merely constituting a self-serving canard that is not worth his attention. The president’s friends do not see the need to investigate the allegations by the Senate that the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is amenable to the patronage of those he is supposed to investigate for corruption and his complicity in other myriad unethical practices that have rendered him ineligible to occupy that high office.

*Ibrahim Magu

These friends and those of Magu have instigated a rash of lobbying activities geared at making the president to re-nominate Magu for confirmation as the EFCC chair. It has been said that the debate on whether to retain Magu or not has split the kitchen cabinet of the president. The Senate is equally split as some senators led by Senate Majority Leader Ali Ndume are trying to persuade their colleagues to rescind their decision not to confirm Magu.

Yet, the issue requires far more than lobbying. For whether the anti-corruption campaign of Buhari retains whatever credibility it still has now or not depends on how the Magu issue is resolved. Thus for the anti-corruption campaign to continue and indeed gain greater verve, the allegations against Magu must not be glossed over. True, the Senate that accused Magu of corruption is perceived to have lost its lustre in a murky cesspool of malfeasance. Its leader, Bukola Saraki is being tried by the Code of Conduct Tribunal for corruption-related cases.

There are other members of the Senate, especially former governors, who are facing cases of corruption. Despite the mounting pressure from the public, the Senate has refused to be transparent in its finances. The fogginess about their salaries and allowances and their extravagant lifestyles conflict with the desperate economic crisis of the nation. But we must resist the temptation to quickly dismiss the senators’ position until their allegations are investigated. It is only after this that we can be sure whether the Senate took their position in furtherance of their own interest or that of the nation. It is hasty to argue that by the Senate’s position, it is evident that corruption is fighting back.

Those who are insisting on saving Magu without investigating the allegations against him are not helping the anti-corruption fight. For even if the president is able to persuade the Senate to make a barefaced volte-face and confirm Magu, this would not help the anti-corruption campaign as long as there are no convincing responses by him to the allegations of corruption. To the extent that Magu on whom unresolved corruption charges are hanging retains his job as the chief prosecutor of the fight against sleaze in public offices, the anti-corruption fight has suffered an intolerable travesty that would only render the nation a butt of crude jokes in the comity of transparent nations. If Magu is found guilty of the charges, Buhari should allow him to face prosecution.