By Abdullahi Mohammed
The Executive Chairman Coalition Against Corrupt Leaders ( CACOL) Mr Debo Adeniran has advised president Muhammadu Buhari to make his declaration of assets public to lay good example to other public office holders. He made this assertion today at the event on the CSOs media interaction on anti corruption at Stonehedge Hotel in Abuja on Tuesday.The meeting canvassed the strengthening of the anti corruption battle.Speakers demanded special focus on the role of judges in the anti-graft war.
Mr Adeniran suggested that “the advice to Buhari is to ..first and foremost make his declaration of his own asset public .” He also urged him “to strengthen the anti corruption agencies with funds , training and even protection to their own lives and cooperations with other countries with mutual legal assistance .He also Also noted that the media needs to help in anti corruption crusade that
“Most of the time when you fight corruption, corruption complains and actually fight back, the way they fight back is first and foremost to try to discredit the reasons why you are being prosecuted in the first place . They want to actually water down the essence instead of that prosecution when they tell you that the prosecution is selective. What they are saying is that you should not select them at the time you are selecting them, their argument can never be that they didn’t commit the crime .None of them who claimed that in the anti corruption agencies are selective has ever denied that they are not involved in it .Nobody said you should call a suspect a criminal already except you know that they are actually being criminal because there are occasion where it is certain that this fellow is a criminal and they have perpetuated some criminal act that is obvious to (every) Tom, Dick and Harry. But some time many of you ,your platforms, shy away even from convicted ones because some of you actually know or you have relationship with some of them you will just okay their crime”, he said.
Adesina said that “the convicted must be shamed if you don’t shame them they integrate themselves back into the same society and they make others thinks that corruption pays, that should be discouraged by the media. You should call them criminal when they are convicted. We have James Iboris of this world , we have Alamiyeseigha who has claimed to be pardoned, Cecilia Ibru, Tafa Balagun, Yakubu Yusuf and we have a number of them that have been convicted. Even those who deep their hands in their back pockets to pay the fine they are also convicted criminals. The media has not been calling them their true names. We called them Convicts Of The Federal Republic ( CFR)
One of the coveners , Say No Campaign, Mr Ezenwa Nwagwu said that ” every kobo that is recovered ,everybody that is sent to jail on the account of putting their dirty fingers in our common till sends a strong message and deterrent. The man who is probing today is doing that on the basis of the fact that when he finishes that the person also takes over from him will have a legal basis, moral basis to probe him as well, so if you didn’t probe you are simply saying that don’t probe me because I didn’t probe and that cannot be a good narrative. So how do we collectively as a citizen own this fight , do we understand the benefits as a people. That is what this conference is about .
Mr Ezenwa sighting that “the anti corruption agencies would be on the search light of corrupt people right now. There are people who are thinking that the fight is coming to them even though it has not yet come to them. They know the fight is already coming; so what do they do they fold their arms and clap no! They’ll start shouting now because this is the time to start shouting now. This is the time to start shouting oh! He is selective , Oh! He is selective, Oh! He is persecuting his enemies so that you don’t get to them and .For Christ sake do we even know that the current investigations are not new ? Yesterday Femi Falana told us that the petitions against the cabals were initiated by president Goodluck Jonathan. It was Mrs Alison Madueke knowing she will herself be implicated decided to do what she has done . First by petitioning against even the oil czars so there are no new investigation. It was actually the PDP government that wrote the petitions that are currently investigated .There is no new thing,” he affirmed.
“We are lucky to have a government that wants to confront the monster of corruption .It is our duty as citizens to strengthen their hands and encourage them to make sure that all the onslaught by the enemies of our country and when I say the enemy of our country . The people who have stolen our common resources cannot be our friends” he appealed.
He also called on “the anti corruption agencies to beam their satellites on the judges themselves. There is nothing that says that an indicted judged cannot be tried and sentenced to jail. U,ntil judges start going to prison the anti corruption fight may not have started .The way it should start so we need to focus our attention to those institutions as well. The judiciary must help this fight . The anti corruption agencies have woken up, the (ones) that have not woken up like the code of conduct of bureau needs to step up their games as well now to ensure that our country is rid of corruption..
Also Mohammed B Attah, head of Procurement Observation And Advocacy Initiative,PRADIN who spoke at the event said ” far more important is the fact that as a member of a civil society which the media are, there is no way we can do this fight without you. There is no way we can move ahead without involving you. You will have noticed that what we are witnessing is a new regime and I think we have a window of opportunity that we have to take advantage of. If we fail to take advantage of that now honestly , only God knows what will happen in subsequent dispensation. That is why we have to cry and ensure that doesn’t happen. we assume we are always thinking alike as media and civil society practitioners”.
The chairman Civil Society Network Against Corruption Olarenwaju Suraju also briefed the press said “I think we have actually acknowledged that judiciary needs to act diligently. That is why we are here look at the case of Fani Kayode that took about 8 years even some evidence would be lost, some witnesses would not be willing to testify against him ,some may have died and some of the prosecution officers relocated and you are left with the challenge of sustaining even many of those cases. Like we said the anti corruption institutions have the mandate of investigation and also persecuting but they can’t be the one to either convict or acquits them. ..
“So it is important and this goes to the CJN because the body language of the CJN also will assist with many of the judges on the bench. If it is allowed to be business as usual then they will continue at the rate at which they are going but if the CJN reads out the riot act and the anti corruption can also beam their satellite on the judges .
