Gbemiga Olakunle
In the last four weeks, the Nigerian media have been awash with breaking news of recovered loot that were either abandoned at airports or discovered in shopping complex or residential buildings. Already, Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has lent his support to the new trend, which has become a major strategy in the fight against corruption by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFFC). He revealed that looters have more money in their possession than all tiers of government in the country. The minister said: “It is now obvious that more funds are in the possession of looters than are available to government at all levels to meet their obligations including paying workers’ salaries, providing social amenities, upgrading infrastructure and ensuring the security of lives and property.
As the looters continue to run helter skelter, many of them are even abandoning their booty at unusual places including airports.”
In recording these outstanding successes in the loot recovery drive being championed by the EFCC, kudos should be given to members of the public who are coming forward to secretly drop hints or tip-offs on the hidden places where these loots were kept in line with the whistle-blowing policy of the federal government.
Despite these laudable developments in its loot recovery drive, there is heightened fear being expressed by some concerned members of the public that if care is not taken, the ill-gotten wealth being recovered from the suspected looters may be re-looted. And this kind of fear is not unfounded. For instance, it is an open secret now that a large chunk, over 50%, of the Abacha loot that was recovered during the immediate past administration of Goodluck Jonathan was allegedly re-looted through the Office of the then National Security Adviser, retired Colonel Sambo Dasuki.
This was done under the guise of buying arms and ammunition in order to equip our security outfits, especially the military, to fight the Boko Haram insurgents, whose fire was spreading fast to the other parts of the country from its epicenter, Maiduguri, in the North-east. And that is the major reason Dasuki is still standing trial today, and on remand at Kuje Prison, although there may be other charges against him.
And in order to allay this fear, the Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, has assured the nation that the loots being recovered now will not be re-looted. Specifically, she mentioned that such forfeited loots will be used to fund the budget. Even though we are in agreement with the minister, we are of the candid opinion that the recovered loot should be separated from the normal budgeting system of the nation so that the money will not be subjected to budget-padding.
In other words, the recovered money should be kept in a special account with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the updates of its balance should be in the public domain from time to time. The money in such an account should not be used by the government to pursue white elephant projects that may not have direct bearing at improving the deplorable living condition of the citizens. Rather the recovered loot should be invested into fighting hunger and some identified cases of preventable diseases in the land. Recently, the United Nations made a shocking revelation that if adequate funds were not mobilized by June this year, about five million people in the North-east will be at high risk of death through starvation.
In addition, as earlier mentioned in the article preceding this one, the federal government can also use the money to embark on projects that are aimed at reducing the high infant mortality rates in our country by the establishment of mother and child care centres in all the local government areas throughout the federation to take care of pregnant women before and after the delivery of their babies. And in a related development, just to ensure that the life expectancy of Nigerians is improved, we also recommend the commencement of rapid response rescue outfits on our major roads to rescue and attend to accident victims within 10 – 15 minutes of any road mishap.
Specifically, in that particular article titled “Unending recovery of loots: Has Nigeria turned to a big den of robbers?”, we did point out that the two recommended schemes are the brain child of the immediate former Governor of Ondo State, Dr. Olusegun Mimiko. And that the federal government should not shy away from copying good schemes whenever they can find them, irrespective of party affiliations as long as such programmes stand to benefit majority of Nigerians.
Succinctly speaking, except for the loots whose actual ownership is still being determined by the courts, those already forfeited to the coffers of the federal government should be put into immediate use through the implementation of the aforementioned schemes to avoid the temptation of re-looting of such recovered loots.
With Nigerian public officials, this temptation is very real and we should not tempt our officials with unending custody of such monies. We don’t want a case of “Ole gbe e, Ole gba,” meaning that one thief stole it, while another thief snatched it.
