Truths, Lies And My EFCC Days By Nuhu Ribadu

I read Mahmud Jega's Daily Trust column a fortnight ago, with the
title "Gra-gra versus softly-softly". It was composed in his
characteristic meticulousness which also touched a nerve that concerns
all.
[image]It also involved me, personally. It involved me because
thepiece was not only about anti-corruption struggle, something I came
to be more identified with in thecourse of my career, but also because
I was mentioned, or referenced to, many times in the piece. In the
piece, Jega repeated several erroneous notions about my work at the
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). But to be fair to
him, those insinuations were far from being his concoctions.
They have been held for a long time bya section of Nigerians who were
largely misinformed about the modus operandi of the EFCC I headed, or
aboutme as a person. I therefore thought it aduty to correct some of
the wrong impressions people have about what we did, for the sake of
futurity and the reading public.
I must, however, appreciate many of the positive things about our
operations and modest achievements at the EFCC highlighted by Jega.
Those were things we achieved largely because of our resolve to form a
strongand professional agency, from the outset. Strong institutions
are at the base of whatever things to come out ofa system. This was a
major focus for us. There were deliberate steps at capacity building
that would prove extremely advantageous for the work we did in the
five years I was there. I use "we" because the work was never a one
man job. EFCC was beyond Nuhu Ribadu, or any individual for that
matter. It was a team work. The patriotism, esprit de corp and
professionalism exhibited by the teamwere the secrets for our
successes.
But as I always insist, success of anti-graft efforts is hinged
largely at the leadership level, especially the political leadership.
We were lucky to have the cooperation of the leadershipat the time. To
the credit of President Olusegun Obasanjo, he let us do the work even
at a time we were going against some elements that were extremely
close to him. It is therefore amusing when I hear people these days
charge me of "selective justice".
Well, perhaps those charges could be passed as the example of what
Wole Soyinka called " our collective amnesia". Take a comprehensive
list ofhigh profile people EFCC brought to justice, majority of them
were people that could be correctly tagged"Obasanjo boys". Even though
some of them suddenly turn around the moment they found themselves in
trouble with the law, as a way of buying public sympathy.
Unfortunately, many people don't strive to stretch the facts to reveal
this truth. One largely neglected pillar of our work was the Judiciary
and the criminal justice system generally. We had the support of other
people in the justice administration chain. Without the will of
incorruptible judges and other law enforcement officials, all our
modest effort would have come to nought.
However, the main thesis of Jega's essay, which was also made clear
from the title, was that the EFCC I headed was something of a gra-gra
agency - a body that is peopled with exuberant officers eager to
arrest suspects in order to hit the headlines. This is a flawed
assessment of it. It is also something that people come to believe,
largely on account of the agency's portrayal in the media. EFCC was,
and is, never about arrests. In fact,arrest was just a fraction of the
entire work. But because arrest is what makes the news, the myriad of
steps and processes we follow before and after arrest are mostly
overlooked.
Every step in administration of a corruption case is carefully
outlined and has its rigours and identified procedures. A lot of work
would have to be put in from the point of accepting a petition or
starting a case, analysing it, identifying the key issues and persons,
investigation, sourcing documents, obtaining arrest and search
warrants, preparing charges and then arrest.
We tried to work on each of the steps in a very meticulous manner. It
is a little surprise therefore, that throughout my period there was
only one person who took me to court challenging his detention by the
EFCC. He also lost the suit. The reason was simple: we followed the
law and therefore had to do our homework before we pick anybody.
Similarly, to point to the meticulous nature of whatwe did, it is in
record that the EFCC recorded a world record of over 90 percent
convictions on all the cases weprosecuted. I don't think gra-gra
wouldyield these results.It is also incorrect to say that EFCC didn't
pursue preventive measures as regards corruption. We fully appreciated
the fact that the twin strategy of prevention and sanctioningmust
always go together in law enforcement in general and fighting
corruption in particular. The preventive measures of the EFCC were
often overshadowed by the news selling headlines about arrests but
EFCC took a lot of preventive measures.Major ones include the
establishment of the Training and Research Institute that has been
carrying out studies on corruption prevention in both public and
private sectors.
The institute is in the lead in training of detectives, public
servants, bankers and so many others in Nigeria today. The
establishment of Financial Intelligence Unit is one of the most
important steps in preventive measures of controlling corruption
globally, EFCC has done it for Nigeria. EFCC also worked to establish
international networks and linkages, notably with the United Nations,
FBI, Metropolitan Police, German BKA, and West African
anti-money-laundering group, GIABA, among others.
We also worked closely with many departments of governments, civil
society groups, religious organisationsand schools, on public
enlightenment to stem corruption in the society. EFCC also engaged the
National Assembly toamend laws, the judiciary on corruption prevention
and justice delivery, the customs, the FIRS, NPA and many states and
local governments. In fact, many of the arrests made by EFCC arose out
of whistle-blowing efforts through these mechanisms. By the way,
arrests and prosecutions are also very powerful tools of preventive
measures, because they do send a strong message that one cannot get
away with corrupt practice, no matter how highly placed.
The article also mentioned the impeachment of three governors
allegedly influenced by the EFCC. I try as much as possible not to be
personal by commenting on such cases but the fact that it is suddenly
gaining currency, makes it only sensible to clear the misconceptions.
The EFCC did not and could not have impeached anygovernor or force
legislators to do so. It will be unfair to deny the legislators the
credit of doing their constitutional responsibilities. The EFCC did
its part ofthe responsibility of investigation and submission of
findings to the various State Assemblies all over the nation. Some
state assemblies had cause to act on such reports, others did not.
But we certainly did not force anyone to take any action. My
understanding of events then was that two out of the three former
governors got arrested inLondon with millions of Pounds. They
absconded from justice there and that triggered chain of events that
culminated in their lost of political control of their states and
thereby resulted in their impeachments. The former governor of Ekiti
state had his own local issues. He lost out with the elite of the
state, his political party, and other stakeholders. His ordeals had
nothing to do with the EFCC. In all the cases, it was obvious that the
governors lost out with their political parties and therefore the
assembly members were more than willing to act on the thorough
investigation reports of the EFCC. The reports were the extent of
EFCC's involvement in those impeachments.
As a proviso, I want to state that all the actions we took while at
the EFCC weretaken with the purest of intentions and based on
available facts before us at the time. But it is understandable that
in everything we do as humans, we are bound to be misunderstood.
However, fear of being misunderstood should not be an excuse for not
moving to salvage our country. As citizens, we all have the civic
responsibility of playing our part in healing the country of its
myriad of maladies and guiding it to the coast of prosperity.
Ribadu is the former EFCC chairman.