Corruption allegations: Like Magu, Bawa must quit now, face probe panel – CSOs tell FG

Following Zamfara State governor, Bello Matawalle’s outburst on Wednesday, that he and some other prominent Nigerians have evidence of corrupt practices against the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa, notable Anti-Corruption crusaders in Nigeria, numbering over 150, have said he can no longer continue to stay in office but leave office like his predecessor, Ibrahim Magu.

The Anti-corruption crusaders led by the Chairman, Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL), Debo Adeniran, gave this stand on Thursday in Lagos at a press conference, saying that they had refused to be cowed into shelving their agitation for a genuine fight against corruption in Nigeria.

The activists, while noting that elected officials must account for their actions in office, said they shared Matawalle’s view that the investigations being called for against Bawa must not be selective but all-embracing.

According to them, the EFCC is an important agency in Nigeria, established to rid the society of corruption with impunity, saying it was not conceived as an agency meant for settling scores for political godfathers.

This was just as the activists pointedly asserted that it was the standard practice globally for officials who had been accused of gross misconduct to step aside while investigations were conducted to ascertain the veracity of the allegations.

The Anti-corruption crusaders, therefore, called for a full probe into the activities of the EFCC under Bawa, even as they quickly recalled that his predecessor, Ibrahim Magu, was not only told to step aside when Bawa’s godfather wanted him out at all costs but was humiliated out of office, with no one knowing the exact outcome of the probe against him up till now.

“His predecessor, Ibrahim Magu, was not only told to step aside when Bawa’s godfather wanted him out at all costs but he was also humiliated out of the office and up till tomorrow, no one knows the exact outcome of the probe against him,” they said in their speech.

According to them, from the interaction of Journalists and CSOs with ordinary Nigerians who had been invited for one reason or the other at the Commission, they alleged that “there have been several allegations to the effect that about 80 per cent of cases under EFCC investigation are not taken to court. EFCC offices now literally serve as courtrooms.”

“There are damning allegations that some of the Commission’s officials simply negotiate with suspects, get assets and cash retrieved and do plea bargains. This opens limitless opportunities for corrupt bargaining and self-enrichment by the operatives of EFCC under Mr Bawa’s watch,” the anti-corruption activists further alleged.

“This needs to be thoroughly investigated by a technical Commission of Inquiry to dig into the modus operandi of EFCC investigations in the last three years by thoroughly analysing records of arrests, investigations, outcomes and final closure of each incident and individual suspects and how the matters were eventually dispensed with,” they demanded.

In a speech titled: “Bawa cannot remain in office with direct corruption allegations against him, he must step aside to be investigated,” delivered on behalf of the CSOs, their spokesperson, Comrade Olufemi Lawson, stated that allegations of sharp practices with confiscated assets by the Commission had refused to go away, saying that all seized assets needed to be forensically audited with a view to recovering all those re-looted or auctioned in suspicious circumstances.

“Allegations of sharp practices with confiscated assets by the Commission have refused to go away. To this end, all seized assets need to be forensically audited with a view to recovering all assets re-looted or auctioned in suspicious circumstances.

“The Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa, has been convicted for contempt over his failure to comply with an earlier order of the court. As we speak, the Inspector-General of Police has not complied with a court order to commit Bawa to Kuje Prison while Bawa has not deemed it fit to purge himself of contempt,” he said.

Lawson faulted the claims by Bawa that the EFCC under him had secured 98.93 per cent of convictions in 2022, losing only 1.07 per cent, describing such as spurious, noting that a large chunk of the convictions were online fraudsters, while favoured political office holders were left untouched.

“We are also aware that in December 2022, the Bawa-led EFCC announced its plan to sell forfeited properties. It also announced later in January that about 12 bids were made for those properties and, later, that six of those bids were successful.

“No details of this were made public, either to know successful bids or rejected ones. This was a ploy, in our opinion, to make the processes less transparent and, therefore, facilitate corrupt mismanagement of the proceeds or ensure that only their corrupt allies got the opportunity to purchase the assets at giveaway prices. The processes were rendered opaque and that’s very suspicious.

“The EFCC has done a selective invitation to outgoing Governors in Nigeria, reportedly exempting other government officials who have loads of petitions against them, even by Governors.”

“If a government agency expected to fight crime is found going about its business in a manner that mimics witch-hunt and selective justice while also being unable to deal with the corruption going on within its own workforce, the Coalition of Anti-Corruption Organizations, COACOs, is afraid that the nation may slide into some real crisis of confidence in our systems, which is bound to provoke a defunding of the EFCC by local and international donor organizations,” the activists stressed.

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