Only Buhari, Osinbajo fighting corruption – Presidential aide

The Chairman, Special Presidential Investigation Panel for the
Recovery of Public Property, Okoi Obono-Obla, has accused Nigerians
of refusing to support the anti-graft crusade of the President
Muhammadu Buhari administration.

The presidential aide spoke on a Channels Television programme,
Sunrise Daily, on Thursday.

Reacting to the Nigerian Corruption Survey 2017 published by the
National Bureau for Statistics, which states that Nigerians paid
bribes to the tune of N400bn between 2015 and 2016, Obono-Obla
said, “It is chilling, daunting, outrageous and shocking but I am
not surprised because corruption has become pandemic and endemic.
Most Nigerians are pathologically corrupt.

“This government wants to fight corruption but what is the
challenge? Nigerians do not want to support the fight against
corruption; the judiciary and the legislature do not want to
support the fight against corruption. It is as if only the
President and the Vice-President are in support of the war against
corruption.”

Obono-Obla said Nigeria had laws that could be used in jailing
corrupt people but past governments were not brave enough to take
the bull by the horn.

He said the Recovery of Public Property Special Provisions Act
Cap R4 Laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria had existed since
1983 but had never been used by any government to tackle
corruption.

The presidential aide added, “The law we are using to fight
corruption now has been in effect since 1983 but that law has not
been used by successive governments because these successive
administrations did not have the will, did not have the commitment
or dedication to fight corruption and this government has gone into
the archives to exhume that law to fight corruption and the law is
very strict and maybe that is why successive administrations did
not use that law in fighting corruption. That law predates the EFCC
and ICPC Act.”

Also in an interview with one of our correspondents, Obono-Obla
scolded ex-President Goodluck Jonathan for claiming he fought
corruption, saying his administration was “scandalously
corrupt.”

“Why is this man blowing hot and cold? Anyone blowing hot and
cold is not a man of integrity. Anyone who doesn’t speak the truth
is not a man of integrity. More than N500bn was stolen by officials
of his government. That was why Nigeria went bankrupt. That was why
more than $48bn that was left by the Musa Yar’Adua’s government was
squandered.

“If $48bn was intact, we would not be looking for money to do
railway from Lagos to Calabar and from Lagos to Kano and so on and
so forth. The stolen money would have been used to cushion the
effects of the drastic fall in oil prices, which is the mainstay of
our economy.

“We know that his government was chronologically and
scandalously corrupt. There is no doubt about it. The evidence is
in Jonathan’s Petroleum minister and the few billions of naira we
have seized from her property. That property is more than the
budgets of the northern states put together in four years. So, what
is he talking about? There was unemployment, fuel scarcity and a
lot of money was stolen under his watch,” he said.

The Chairman, Special Presidential Investigation Panel for the
Recovery of Public Property, Okoi Obono-Obla, has accused Nigerians
of refusing to support the anti-graft crusade of the President
Muhammadu Buhari administration.

The presidential aide spoke on a Channels Television programme,
Sunrise Daily, on Thursday.

Reacting to the Nigerian Corruption Survey 2017 published by the
National Bureau for Statistics, which states that Nigerians paid
bribes to the tune of N400bn between 2015 and 2016, Obono-Obla
said, “It is chilling, daunting, outrageous and shocking but I am
not surprised because corruption has become pandemic and endemic.
Most Nigerians are pathologically corrupt.

“This government wants to fight corruption but what is the
challenge? Nigerians do not want to support the fight against
corruption; the judiciary and the legislature do not want to
support the fight against corruption. It is as if only the
President and the Vice-President are in support of the war against
corruption.”

Obono-Obla said Nigeria had laws that could be used in jailing
corrupt people but past governments were not brave enough to take
the bull by the horn.

He said the Recovery of Public Property Special Provisions Act
Cap R4 Laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria had existed since
1983 but had never been used by any government to tackle
corruption.

The presidential aide added, “The law we are using to fight
corruption now has been in effect since 1983 but that law has not
been used by successive governments because these successive
administrations did not have the will, did not have the commitment
or dedication to fight corruption and this government has gone into
the archives to exhume that law to fight corruption and the law is
very strict and maybe that is why successive administrations did
not use that law in fighting corruption. That law predates the EFCC
and ICPC Act.”

Also in an interview with one of our correspondents, Obono-Obla
scolded ex-President Goodluck Jonathan for claiming he fought
corruption, saying his administration was “scandalously
corrupt.”

“Why is this man blowing hot and cold? Anyone blowing hot and
cold is not a man of integrity. Anyone who doesn’t speak the truth
is not a man of integrity. More than N500bn was stolen by officials
of his government. That was why Nigeria went bankrupt. That was why
more than $48bn that was left by the Musa Yar’Adua’s government was
squandered.

“If $48bn was intact, we would not be looking for money to do
railway from Lagos to Calabar and from Lagos to Kano and so on and
so forth. The stolen money would have been used to cushion the
effects of the drastic fall in oil prices, which is the mainstay of
our economy.

“We know that his government was chronologically and
scandalously corrupt. There is no doubt about it. The evidence is
in Jonathan’s Petroleum minister and the few billions of naira we
have seized from her property. That property is more than the
budgets of the northern states put together in four years. So, what
is he talking about? There was unemployment, fuel scarcity and a
lot of money was stolen under his watch,” he said.