7 Ways to Fight Corruption – Falana

THE NEWS

Mr Femi Falana, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, who participated in the Webinar Series No 9 held by Rule of Law Development Foundation on July 10, 2023 set agenda for the new government in Nigeria on how to fight corruption. He advocated that the National Assembly should pass the the Whistle Blower Bill and Witness Protection Bill, the Office of the Accountant-General should resume the publication of the monthly statutory allocations to the federal, state, and local governments. assets declared by all public officers should be published, former governors in the Senate and those who may be in the Federal Executive Council should not be paid pension, the Federal Ministry of Justice should summarize and publish all anti-corruption laws and distribute them to members of the public.

Apart from a general salary review for all public officers and civil servants and direct cash transfer should be made to the 133 million who are extremely poor, Falana said the Peoples Bank should be reestablished and revitalised to afford indigent citizens the opportunity to apply for soft loans.

Below is Falana’s submission:

Anti-corruption Agenda Setting For Nigeria 

Introduction 

I thank the Rule of Law Development Foundation for convening this webinar to set an agenda for the Tinubu Administration to follow as a blueprint for the fight against corruption and fraud in Nigeria. Since the restoration of civil rule in 1999, civil society organizations have always set an anti-graft agenda for every government. But, the  method has failed to achieve the desired objective due to lack of political will on the part of the government to confront corruption headlong. Instead of settling agenda for the new  government, which may have developed its own anti-graft agenda, I am going to make a case for agenda setting for the people. Since the people are the victims of corruption, it is their duty to expose and fight official corruption.

Anti-Corruption Agenda of APC

In its manifesto, the All Progressive Congress claims to have “a zero-tolerance approach to corruption-rooting out dishonest public servants and imposing tough sanctions, including jail sentences.”  The MohammaduBuhari administration made the fight against corruption one of its three  cardinalprogrammes. The Nigerian people were made to believe that the Federal Government would frontally confront the menace of corruption. The people of Africa believed that Nigeria was prepared to lead the continent in the fight against corruption. Hence, the member states of the African Union unanimously appointed President Buhari as the Champion of Anti-Corruption in Africa

But shortly thereafter, Nigeria disappointed Africa as the war against corruption was defeated by the government itself. Many politically exposed persons who were charged for money laundering running to billions of Naira were either freed by the anti-graft agencies or on by the courts on technical grounds. It is on record that the President did not sanction many members of the cabal and the cabinet who were indicted for criminal diversion of huge public funds.

As if that was not enough, former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr. AbubakarMalami SAN teamed up with highly corrupt elements to sabotage the anti- corruption campaign. On a regular basis, the Justice Minister filed nolleprosequi applications to…