The Acting Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, has described the resistance against the
ongoing anti-graft war by the corrupt elements in the country as frightening.
He said though no one would expect the fight against
corruption to be smooth, the resistance had assumed frightening dimensions with
political motives inputted into most of the activities of the Commission,
especially as the next general election approaches.
Speaking during a meeting with media executives in Lagos on
Wednesday, September 5, 2018, Magu added that it had become fashionable for
anyone being investigated for corruption to “scream political persecution.”
He said: “Corrupt officials of state governments are
pleading immunity not ascribed to them by the Constitution. “Some governors
have also extended the frontiers of their constitutional immunity by claiming
that anti-corruption agencies cannot even investigate them.”
Magu, who described the event as part of his interface with
critical stakeholders, therefore, urged the media to be more vigilant, adding
that “as I have stated in various forum, the EFCC is apolitical and will not
knock on your door, if you have not violated the law.
“The media owes Nigerians a duty not to allow the corrupt to
deploy their ill-gotten riches to corner the machinery of government. Such
folly was injurious to our national wellbeing in the past and will not profit
us in the future.”
The EFCC boss, who further stated that the Commission was
making progress, in spite of the distractions and irritations by the corrupt,
also used the occasion to reiterate that the Commission, under his leadership,
had recorded improvements in the areas of prosecution of persons for corruption
and recovery of stolen assets.'
“So far this year, we have had the honour of sending two
former governors to jail for 14 years each. It has never happened", Magu
said.
