EFCC’s laughable subsidy theft recovery

EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Lamorde
| credits: File copy

IT is still quite unclear what point the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission was trying to make when it recently announced the recovery of N5 billion from oil subsidy thieves. The EFCC boss, Ibrahim Lamorde, who made the ridiculous announcement at a workshop for journalists in Enugu, also stated that, besides embarking on further investigations intended to bring others still evading justice to book, 40 cases were already being prosecuted.

However, if the agency had expected its announcement to draw applause, then it missed the point completely. If anything, the efforts of the EFCC, as enunciated by Lamorde, who was represented by the Deputy Director, Public Affairs Department, Osita Nwajah, only succeeded in unwittingly exposing the commission’s incompetence and, perhaps, insincerity, in its anti-graft crusade, that has resulted in a gradual descent into irrelevance of an agency that once struck fear into the hearts of corrupt politicians.

The fuel subsidy scam remains arguably the biggest heist ever pulled off in this country. According to the report of the House of Representatives ad hoc committee that investigated the crime, N2.58 trillion was involved in the bazaar. Out of that amount, about N1.7 trillion could not be properly accounted for.

It is quite regrettable that a country which still lacks basic infrastructure and operates at the lowest rung of the United Nations Human Development Index could lose such a huge amount to an organised criminal cabal without any serious effort by the state to deal with the matter. To worsen matters, government agencies, such as the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and the Central Bank of Nigeria, saddled with the responsibility of rendering accounts of how the money was spent, ended up presenting conflicting reports.

Yet, more than two years after the mind-boggling looting was uncovered, nobody is in jail; no conviction has been secured. That the EFCC still has the temerity to triumphantly tell Nigerians that a mere N5 billion had been recovered out of the amount stolen only shows what a joke the commission has become. This is indeed an assault on the sensibilities of Nigerians who had waited in vain to see the day justice would be served on culprits in this clear case of reckless looting of the national treasury.

As the popular saying goes, justice delayed is justice denied. From the way the cases have been handled, lack of interest in prosecuting suspects is evident; and it has been so right from the beginning. Even when the chairman of the ad hoc committee, Farouk Lawan, was reportedly caught in his own web, while allegedly collecting a $620,000 bribe to strike out the name of one of the indicted companies, the suspect still trots the Nigerian landscape a free man. How can the EFCC explain that? How many years does it take to prosecute a suspect?

At a point, it was a popular government’s refrain, as its evidence of fighting corruption, to claim that the current administration was the first to bring to trial the sons of some prominent Nigerians for their involvement in illegal subsidy deals, where all that was needed to be paid billions of naira was the presentation of papers, whether fuel was imported or not. Among those involved were a son of Bamanga Tukur, then the chairman of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party; and a son of Ahmadu Ali, also a former chairman of the party. Thereafter, little has been heard of that shambolic trial.

For those who have kept a close watch over the activities of the commission in the past few years, it should not really come as a surprise. With the exception of one or two state governors who got away with light sentences under the tenure of Nuhu Ribadu as the commission’s boss, it is interesting to note that the EFCC has found it difficult to secure convictions in corruption cases at a time when graft has reached an unprecedented height in the country.

Even when some feeble efforts are made to bring a few to trial, the cases are usually struck out by the courts for want of diligent prosecution. From an agency that once gained global recognition for its doggedness, the EFCC has now been reduced to chasing small-time fraudsters and Internet thieves all over the country. At the time Farida Waziri was replaced as the EFCC boss, Human Rights Watch, an international anti-corruption watchdog, summarised the performance of the agency thus: “It (the EFCC) has arraigned 35 nationally prominent political figures on corruption charges, including 19 former state governors. But many of these cases have made little progress in the courts and not a single politician is currently serving prison time for any of these alleged crimes.”

If this was the assessment of Waziri’s tenure, not much has changed since then. Now, corrupt politicians are not even arraigned at all. If the commission wants to win back public admiration, it should go ahead and recover the stolen public funds. It should be talking about convictions, especially of those that stole hundreds of billions, in addition to the ongoing trial of those who made away with N1.2 billion or N1.8 billion, as the commission is currently doing. Until then, nobody is going to take the EFCC seriously.