Yahaya Bello: CUPP criticises EFCC, says leadership incompetent

The Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) has lambasted the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for failing to carry out its threat to arrest former Governor Yahaya Bello of Kogi State, alleging that “the leadership of the commission in its current state is grossly incompetent.”

CUPP, in a statement on Tuesday, stated that there was no valid excuse for the EFCC’s failure to arrest Yahaya Bello when he personally went to their office. Instead, armed personnel invaded the Kogi governor’s lodge in Abuja the same night under the pretext of arresting the former governor.

In the statement signed by ten officials of the coalition, including Mr. Emeka Igwe (Steering Committee member), Alhaji Hamisu Santuraki (Media Committee member), Prince Frank Ukonga (Strategy Committee member), Prof. Godswill Nnaji (Steering Committee member), and Alhaji Takai Adamu (Steering Committee member), CUPP expressed that the EFCC had no excuse for its poor judgment on the day the former governor reportedly submitted himself to the commission. They called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to sack the chairman of the commission, Ola Olukoyede.

The CUPP stated: “It is with utmost disappointment that we view the ongoing drama between the EFCC and the immediate past governor of Kogi State, Yahaya Bello. We are aware that there has been some inexplicable back-and-forth between the EFCC and the former governor for several months, generating considerable public interest across Nigeria.

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“Many Nigerians have been eager to see the day the former governor would be brought in to defend the serious corruption allegations leveled against him by the anti-graft agency.

“The commission went all out to declare him wanted and placed him on an international watchlist with the assistance of INTERPOL, stating that he was to be promptly arrested wherever found.

“It is quite intriguing that the same man you have been hunting for walked into your headquarters in Abuja, and you let him walk away without even interrogating him, citing extremely ridiculous and flimsy excuses, one of which was that he came with a sitting governor, among others.

“A competent head of a security agency like the EFCC would have tactically taken the former governor into custody without much ado. But, clearly, the current leadership of the EFCC is totally clueless about the art of intelligent policing.

“If you couldn’t arrest the former governor in the presence of his predecessor, why send armed operatives to the official residence of the same sitting governor, shooting in the middle of the night under the guise of wanting to arrest someone who had earlier made himself available to you? That incident could have ended fatally with serious consequences for our democracy and overheated the polity beyond control.

“There is no valid excuse in the world for committing those two errors of judgment by the EFCC. First, you let the man you declared wanted escape from your premises under a very suspicious game plan. Secondly, you later mobilized at night to arrest the same man. The EFCC needs to come out and tell Nigerians what they are hiding and their real interests and intentions in this matter.

“Everything about this situation looks suspect.”