Since 1999, state governors have habitually obtained foreign and local loans purportedly for developmental purposes, yet their states remain woefully underdeveloped.
Seeking explanations for this anomaly, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has taken legal action against 36 governors and the Minister for the Federal Capital Territory over their failure to publish the terms of the N5.9 trillion and $4.6 billion loans they obtained and disbursed. They point out, quite correctly, that loans are vulnerable to corruption and mismanagement and their opaque disbursement negates citizen’s fundamental rights to freedom of information. They want the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to investigate how the loans were spent.
Those responsible should not be allowed to evade their obligation to be transparent. It isn’t as if the EFCC is unaware.
Since 1999, Nigeria’s 36 states have had over 170 governors, therefore, simple mathematics tells us that as far as the EFCC is concerned, the majority of them have been corruption-free. Be that as it may, the biggest culprits of misappropriation and incurring unjustifiable debts are state governors.
The immediate past governor of Kogi State is being charged with moving money directly from government accounts to a Bureau de Change to access dollars with which he paid his children’s school fees in advance. In Kaduna State, the current governor has complained about the massive debts left by his predecessor, totalling N85 billion and $587 million as well as a yet-to-be-determined colossal amount owed to contractors.
In Zamfara State, Youths of the All Progressives Congress (APC) have called upon their new governor and the EFCC to go after contractors who failed to execute contracts allegedly paid for according to records submitted by the previous administration.
So many other cases against former governors are pending or have been tied up in the courts that the anti-corruption war has become a subject of ridicule.
To be fair, it’s not only elected state chief executives who engage in treasury looting. The Ilorin Zonal Command of the EFCC has arraigned a former Kwara State Commissioner for Finance over alleged money laundering and misappropriation of state funds to the tune of N1.22 billion. He has pleaded not guilty to the charge.
In Kano State, a lawmaker’s company allegedly collected over N200 million for contracts not executed. The allegations relate to the construction of a college clinic, renovation of a science complex, renovation of student’s hostel, and construction of a hospital theatre which is still not completed six years after the contract award!
As for top political appointees, the EFCC is lining up to charge a former minister of Aviation for an ongoing N8 billion money laundering probe. Also, the EFCC chairman reported that N1.4 billion was moved out of the accounts of the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs in less than one hour! As for the former Central Bank governor, the allegations levelled against him and discoveries of the Special Investigation Panel are so weighty, that they require extensive investigation and cannot be dismissed out of hand.
The ease with which the treasury is looted is facilitated by the fact that proper procedures are never followed when obtaining and disbursing loans. The EFCC boss continuously stresses that in order to fast-track growth and development in the nation, it is important to ensure compliance with rules and regulations for government expenditure. Indeed lack of compliance with financial regulations is the root cause of corruption in the country. Once the nation has got it right with compliance, then Nigeria will have gotten it right with both public and corporate governance.
In the fight against corruption, the EFCC must also look inward. They must cease being obsessed with profiling themselves as some sort of paramilitary force. When their chairman talks of preventing a gunfight between his “gallant men” and police officers in an attempt to arrest a former governor who has not been accused of any violent crime, he is missing the point.
The EFCC is supposed to comprise highly qualified intelligentsia, such as lawyers, information technology experts, accountants, auditors, and electronic surveillance experts, not AK-47 gun-toting “operatives”. Their high-drama, high-profile arrests are unimpressive. They serially lead to the accused walking free to enjoy life with his loot after a plea bargain and the slight inconvenience of short detention.
Disappointingly, the EFCC is earning a reputation for grandstanding rather than fulfilling its duty to obtain successful prosecutions and convictions with prison sentences rather than agreeing to plea bargains which in no way discourage corruption. It must concentrate on successful prosecutions based upon first obtaining all the necessary concrete indisputable evidence prior to arrest. Arresting and detention should be left to the Nigerian police force and prison service.
The lesson which needs to be taken on board is that governors must cease borrowing and accumulating debts for future generations. What the nation requires is for them to concentrate on spending better, not spending more.
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