FG Set to Reshape Anti-corruption War - Osinbajo

The Federal Government is set to overhaul the mech­anisms for implementing the ongoing war against corruption.
The move is to achieve better re­sults and nationwide acceptability of the war against corruption.
The new phase of the crusade will involve a stick and carrot ap­proach, says the Acting President Yemi Osinbajo.
Osinbajo however cautioned Ni­gerians against unhelpful finger-pointing in the war against graft because “all arms and tiers of gov­ernment are complicit.”

Similarly, the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Walter On­noghen, has warned against de­stroying the country’s judiciary in the process of fighting sleaze be­cause not every judicial officer is corrupt.

The Senate President Bukola Sa­raki also advised the relevant au­thorities against making the anti-corruption war a one-man show. He suggested that every depart­ment of government should be al­lowed to exercise its jurisdiction and mandate.
They spoke on Thursday at the National Dialogue on Corruption organised by the Presidential Ad­visory Committee Against Cor­ruption (PACAC) at the Presiden­tial Villa, Abuja.
Osinbajo, who said that he was representing President Muham­madu Buhari because the event was originally designed to have him in attendance, pointed out that cor­ruption cannot be wished away as concrete preventive and punitive measures must be in place to stop the menace.
The Acting President highlighted the Lagos State government mod­el of fighting corruption in the ju­diciary which he initiated when he was the state’s Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice.
Osinbajo asserted that “there’s nobody in our nation that can say they are not in one way or the oth­er, not necessarily being complicit but at least, under some influence or the other of some of the implica­tions of corruption”.
“So, I think we should leave the finger-pointing, because it is un­helpful. What is important is that we recognise that there is a major problem here.
“The truth of the matter is that there is nothing peculiar about the Nigerian citizen, or the Nigerian type. Corruption thrives where it is allowed to thrive and there are many societies that have found themselves in worse circumstanc­es than Nigeria and have somehow managed to solve their problems”.
The Acting President declared that adopting best practices like he did while he was the Attorney-General of Lagos State can effective­ly combat graft.
He recalled how he checked cor­ruption in the Lagos judiciary by improving judges’ welfare and sal­aries and sacking/punishing com­promised judicial officers.
“The bottom line is that we can’t just hope that corruption will stop. Efforts must be made to punish wrongdoing”, he stated in appar­ent response to Onnoghen’s earli­er remarks that fighting corruption in the judiciary can be done better than the current administration is doing.
Osinbajo proffered some solu­tions which include ensuring the integrity of the entire justice sys­tem, such as how judges, lawyers, clerks are appointed.
“Not on man-know-man basis. Aside from the Department of State Services (DSS) investigation, there should be particular test and prop­er investigation of candidates to be appointed as judges.”
He added: “The second thing is to look at the general welfare of the judges (i.e the general remunera­tion of judicial officers).
In his speech, Saraki kicked against the situation where the National Assembly is being paint­ed as a den of corruption and con­demned last year’s raid by the DSS on senior judges’ residences.
His goodwill message was deliv­ered by Senator Chukwuka Utazi.
According to him, “deliberately casting the fight as that of one man, a kind of knight in shining armour, who wrestles with a resisting socie­ty, in my humble view, will not se­cure the desired result”.
“Certain government agen­cies and civil society bodies (and PACAC is not innocent of this), have formed the habit of making a scapegoat of the National Assem­bly as a den of corruption.”
“They deliberately cast institu­tions of state in unsalutory hue that is divorced from reality. It does not help in confidence building, with­in government and across the civ­il population, when institutions of state are deliberately demonised in order to put the shine on others,” Saraki stated.
In his remarks, Onnoghen la­mented how the Nigerian judici­ary has been demonised because “it is unfairly perceived as an epito­me of corruption whereas all other tiers and arms of government are equally complicit.”
Stressing that he did not intend to make excuses for bad eggs, the CJN argued that there are still many gentlemen as judicial offi­cials who should be given the ben­efit of doubt by reporting allega­tions against them to appropriate quarters for investigation and pos­sible sanction instead of clamping down on them in brazenly illegal and unfair manner.
Onnoghen declared that while the judiciary remains committed to and supports government’s ef­forts at curbing corruption, the ef­forts would fare better if govern­ment also tackles the culture of impunity and adhere to the rule of law.
The Chairman of PACAC, Prof. Itsa Sagay, condemned the recent public protests against the Mu­hammadu Buhari’s government, even as he lampooned the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) and the Nigeria Cus­toms Service for engaging in cor­rupt practices.
According to him, “these groups consisting of rented characters, and those who have lost elections or whose federal appointments were not renewed; went about pre­tending that they don’t know those responsible for our catastrophic impoverishment.
“These characters belong to two groups: Those who are agents of the looters, 2010 to 2015, and want to divert the attention of the ordinary Nigerians from the true culprits of our recession and misery, by trans­ferring it to a hardworking, selfless administration which met sand rather than cash in our treasuries.
“The second group are the na­ïve, unthinking ones who cannot make the slightest connection be­tween cause and effect”.
Decrying the request for more funds by the Managing Director of NDDC, Sagay said: “The NDDC is still buying cars costing N78 mil­lion per unit for its officials. What sort of crocodile tears was the MD shedding? Eating the resources and future of the Niger Delta and shed­ding tears for the same Niger Del­ta?”
Sagay accused the Customs of still demanding for and collecting bribes to clear goods at the ports.
In a reaction, the Management of the NDDC said that it was not true that that the commission bought over 70 cars that included eight Super Lexus that cost N70 million each and 10 Toyota Land Cruiser Jeeps at N65 million each.
The NDDC’s Head of Corporate Affairs, Chijioke Amu Nnadi, in a statement he issued in Port Har­court, said that no such purchases had been made since the assump­tion of office on November 4, 2016 of the current Governing Board.
He said that the NDDC’s Chair­man, Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba (SAN), the Managing Director/CEO, Nsima Ekere, and the two Executive Directors are still using their private vehicles three months after assumption of duties.
Nnadi further explained that the commission is only now in the pro­cess of acquiring work vehicles – and is adhering to due process.