The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission must be held to account
The recent directive by the House of Representatives that its Committee on Drugs, Narcotics and Financial Crimes should compel the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to account for all the assets it has seized from suspects since its inception in 2004 is a welcome development. But there are no signs that the House or the EFCC is serious about such an exercise that is needed at a time there are innuendoes and questions about what has happened to such properties.
The decision of the House followed a motion sponsored by Hon. Toby Okechukwu and 15 others who expressed the need for proper management of the seized assets. Okechukwu told the House that the EFCC had, between 2004 and 2010, confiscated over 200 mansions through 46 forfeiture court orders. The seized items include landed property, business concerns, billions of Naira in bank accounts, shares in blue chip companies, exotic vehicles, fuel stations, hotels, warehouses, shopping malls, schools, bakeries, estates, telecommunication companies, and radio stations in and outside Nigeria.
We support the House move in view of the unusual secrecy that has enveloped the seized assets of accused and convicted persons in custody of the EFCC from its inception to date. In the United States of America where “confiscation” or “forfeiture” of assets was first adopted as part of the government’s war against drug barons, property and bank accounts of suspected narcotics lords can be frozen or seized without a court judgement. All that is required is a “reasonable ground” to prove that the assets in question are indeed traceable to the drug baron. In fact this method of fighting crime has caught up in many countries including Britain, Italy and South Africa.
That explains why when the EFCC adopted the asset seizure at its inception about a decade ago it was hailed as one sure way of fighting sleaze. Consequently, the commission has over the years seized countless number of real estate property, vehicles as well as frozen bank accounts and confiscated physical cash. Unfortunately in typical Nigeria fashion, after the initial public show, nothing more is heard of the confiscated assets.
Under its pioneer Chairman, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu and his successor, Mrs. Farida Waziri, the EFCC is known to have seized huge amount of assets from politicians, drug barons, bank chief executives and other suspects and convicts. But the commission has so far failed to account for the whereabouts of these confiscated assets. And as presently alleged on the floor of the House, over $170 million of seized assets was allegedly transferred to an unidentified account, while 200 mansions, countless landed properties and exotic cars were left to rot away or vandalised. According to the House Speaker, Aminu Tambuwal, “these landed property, monies, and business concerns estimated to be in excess of N2 trillion, included bank accounts, shares in blue chip companies, exotic vehicles, fuel stations, holdings, warehouses and shopping malls among others.”
We believe that the House should ensure that the seized assets were accounted for by the EFCC. Such assets were meant to be auctioned in a transparent bid and the proceeds deposited with the Central Bank or the money returned to the government agency or private organisation from where it was looted. It is only proper that the EFCC be held to account for the properties it had confiscated from all the people it had investigated from its inception to date. There is also the urgent need to locate the whereabouts of the $170 million allegedly transferred to an unnamed account after it had been traced to the office of the Accountant- General of the Federation (AGF). For an organisation set up to fight corruption, EFCC should be transparent in its dealings.
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