Despite our efforts, ‘corruption still rampant in Nigeria’ —Magu

The Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu, Tuesday decried the spate of corruption in Nigeria despite efforts to curb the menace.

He spoke in Abuja at the EFCC-National Judicial Institute (NJI) capacity building workshop for justices and judges.

President Muhammadu Buhari listed war against corruption as one of his administration’s major agenda when he came into power in 2015.

The EFCC and other anti-graft agencies in the country have been making efforts to curb corruption in the country.

But at the event, Magu said that despite the dogged fight, “corruption is still rampant (in Nigeria).”

He regretted that institutional responses to corruption fight “are in some instances weak.”

He said that the commission had continue to improve since 2017 till date in terms of conviction profile.

“While the commission secured 190 convictions in 2017, the record for 2018 was 312. From January to October 2019, over 882 convictions have been recorded. This is unprecedented.

“The positive trajectory of conviction record is replicated in assets recovery. From 2015 to date several hundreds of billions of naira have been recovered by the Commission.

“Furthermore, within the same period several properties, including automobiles, motorcycles, lands, farmlands, housing estate; company shares, ocean-going vessels, petroleum products, plazas, hotels, fuel stations, bank accounts and jewelry were forfeited to the Federal Government by order of court.

“While we celebrate these milestones, we must remind ourselves that there is still so much to be done. Corruption is still rampant and, overall, the institutional responses to it are in some instances, weak,” he said.

Also speaking at the event, the chairman, National Judicial Council (NJC)’s Corruption and Financial Crime Cases Trial Monitoring Committee (COTRIMCO), Justice Suleiman Galadima, (rtd) agreed that the fight against corruption and financial crimes had been resolute.

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“Going by the summary obtained from courts handling corruption and financial crimes cases from all states, as at September 2019, the Supreme Court has delivered a total of 52 judgments, 88 from all divisions of the Court Of Appeal, 12 by all the divisions of the Federal High Court, 5 from the FCT High Courts, 188 from the state High Courts and 838 judgments have been delivered as per the update report from EFCC.

“EFCC has announced this morning that N939.51 billion was recovered in four years, about 1,636 convictions were secured within the same year, while N1.28 trillion cash was recovered between 2009 and 2019,” he said.

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