Posted by From AMOS DUNIA, Abuja on
Newly appointed Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mrs Farida Waziri, on Wednesday said she would step on powerful toes in the discharge of her assignment in the anti-graft agency.
• Denies standing surety for Akume
Newly appointed Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mrs Farida Waziri, on Wednesday said she would step on powerful toes in the discharge of her assignment in the anti-graft agency.
Waziri gave the indication that the EFCC under her would not be flat-footed, while being screened by the Senate Committee on Narcotics, Financial Crimes and Anti-Corruption.
Fielding questions from the senators, Waziri also debunked reports that she stood surety for former Benue State Governor, Chief George, who is being tried for money laundering by the EFCC.
'I won't run a PDP-controlled EFCC," the ex-Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) assured, adding that the anti-graft agency under her would not be a political tool for witch-hunting.
She also promised to operate the commission in accordance with the dictates of the rule of law.
'I will step on powerful toes, but I pray God to assist me so that I don't step on innocent toes," Waziri said.
According to her, as a younger person in the police, she had carried out duties at very great risks to her, thus would do more with the nation bestowing on her higher national responsibility.
Mrs Waziri promised to set up a monitoring and intelligence unit that would help to do the work of real monitoring to take care of the abuses where suspects were arrested by the EFCC before evidence was procured to prosecute them.
According to her, prosecution of suspects should be the other way round where evidence must have been obtained before arrest.
The ex-police chief noted that the EFCC under Nuhu Ribadu did well, saying, however, that the agency might have made some mistakes.
When asked how to ensure that case files were not missing because of the vacuum created in the appointment of chairman for the anti-graft agency, Waziri said she would be meticulous in the process of taking and handing over to ensure that the details of every file regarding investigation, prosecution and pending cases were properly documented.
She added that the process might take some weeks but that it was better that details of every file be accounted for than to have them messed up.
In his opening remarks, the committee chairman, Senator Sola Akinyede, said the seven-point agenda of the Umar Yar'Adua administration could not succeed without an effective war against corruption.
Akinyede said that aware of the sensitive nature of the screening of the EFCC nominees, the committee decided that it be televised live so that the nation could observe the process.