The
attention of the Office of the Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ike
Ekweremadu, has been drawn to a statement purportedly issued by the
spokesperson of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr. Wilson
Uwujaren, denying that the agency decorated the Deputy President of the Senate,
Senator Ike Ekweremadu as its Anti-Corruption Ambassador.
We
want to put it on record that the EFCC Liaison Officer to the National
Assembly, Mr. Suleiman Bakari, and his team, applied for and susbsequently paid
a courtesy call on the Deputy President of the Senate in his Office on Tuesday,
April 19, 2016.
Mr.
Bakari, amongst other issues he raised, solicited the support of the Senate and
National Assembly towards the anti-corruption crusade of the present
administration, and even presented a frame with a bold picture of President
Muhammadu Buhari, bearing the inscription: “If we dont kill corruption,
corruption will kill Nigeria”.
Mr.
Bakari also, on behalf of the Acting Chairman, management, and staff of the
EFCC decorated Senator Ekweremadu as an Anti-Corruption Ambassador of the EFCC.
His
words: “It is, therefore my honour, Your Excellency, to on behalf of my Acting
Chairman, Mr. Ibrahim Mustafa Magu and the entire management and staff of the
EFCC, decorate you as
an Anti-Corruption Ambassador and formally present this
frame, as a token of our appreciation to your person and office, and as a
symbol of institutional partnership between the EFCC and the National
Assembly”.
It
is also a fact that the visit and decoration was captured in both pictures and
video.
As
for the purported claim by the EFCC spokesperson that the agency has never and
could not have decorated anybody as an Anti-Corruption Ambassador, since,
according to him, “the Commission is not in the habit of awarding titles to
individuals”, we wish to refer him to December 7, 2007, when the Nuhu
Ribadu-led EFCC confered the Role Model Award in the Fight Against Corruption,
on certain persons, including a former President of the Senate, a taxi driver,
and a former Justice of the Federal High Court at the Musa Yar’Adua Centre,
Abuja.
That
the said denial by the EFCC is coming in two different statements all within a
few hours is, therefore, baffling, inexplicable, and contradicitory.
Taking
cognisance of the command structure of the agency, we also wonder wether Mr.
Bakari could have acted on his own or read from a prepared text without
recourse to the Commission, which he represents, especially as the visit and
decoration was never solicited for in the first place.
We
leave the rest to discerning members of the public to read in-between the lines
and make their own judgments.
However,
Ambassador or no Ambassador, the Deputy President of the Senate will not back
down from his legislative efforts and advocacy as captured in his several
pulbic statements and lectures over the years, pushing for legal and
institutional reforms such as Special Anti-Graft Courts; security of tenure and
financial autonomy for the EFCC and related agencies. Only such reforms would
fast-track justice and insulate the anti-corruption agencies from external
interferences and self-reversals.
Uche
Anichukwu
Special Adviser (Media) to Deputy President of the Senate
Special Adviser (Media) to Deputy President of the Senate
20/04/16
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