Posted by By Jamie Dominics, The Sun Reporter, Washington DC on
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has reiterated that no corrupt person would rule the country again.....
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has reiterated that no corrupt person would rule the country again.
In a statement signed Mr. Osita Nwajah, head, media and Publicity, the EFCC said: "The times have changed. EFCC and the Nigerian people say not anymore, corrupt people are not going to rule over us again."
Reply Mr. Lai Mohammed, chairman, Media and Publicity, Advanced Corgress of Democrats (ACD), who allegedly said that the EFCC was an embarrassment to Nigeria over the arrest of Otunba Mike Adenuga, chairman of Globacom, the commission said: "Lai Mohammed should refrain from jumping into matters he has very little information about or has questionable capacity to decipher."
The EFCC described Mohammed as "a hugue embarrassment to Nigerian democracy," It said: "Lai Mohammed may not be an ‘embarrassment' to his masters, the very same people who gave Nigerians a bad name in the comity of nations; the very same people who promoted corruption and gave protection to the fraudsters and 419ers that EFCC has been successfully battling since 2003;
"Lai Mohammed may be the darling of those who hung a debt albatross on the neck of the country, that EFCC assisted to remove and by so doing, gained the critical endorsement of the international business community;
"Lai Mohammed may consort with those who represent everything that we know is corrupt and wrong in Nigeria today;
"Lai Mohammed may not be an embarrassment to the congenital looters who put us on the world map as the most corrupt nation on earth, which ignominious tag EFCC has been fighting to remove;
"But Lai Mohammed, to all right thinking Nigerians, is a huge embarrassment to Nigerian democracy."
"The commission understands the strategy: Attack everything, no matter what it is, just quixotically attack.
Apart from gaining cheap popularity, those who employ the strategy hope that it would shield them from criminal investigation of their shady corrupt past and present. They expect their blackmail to stop the long arm of the law from hurling them to justice. But, like all the other failed strategies which they have tried, this one will not work with EFCC."
The EFCC said that although it said that Otunba Adenuga was innocent until proved otherwise, he's still being investigated.
Meanwhile, the ACD has described EFCC's position as crude and intemperate.
In a statement on Tuesday, the party said: "In EFCC's warped logic, any individual, political party or organization that does not sing the praise of the EFCC is corrupt; a patron of the Advanced Fee Fraud, otherwise known as 419, and must be held responsible for the debt burden of Nigeria. It is evident from the vituperations of the EFCC that the commission is prosecuting a pro-government political agenda."
The ACD asked the EFCC to be courageous and name "the people they have described in their press release under reference as congenital looters for whom Lai Mohammed is allegedly fronting for," adding: "Nigerians want to know from the EFCC the identity of the people the commission has so glibly referred to as people who cannot have any other life outside corruption, who have mismanaged our resources and who have engineered the systematic failure of our country.
"If the intention of the EFCC is to intimidate the Advanced Congress of Democrats or its spokesperson by these verbal assaults, the strategy has failed woefully as the Advanced Congress of Democrats or its spokesperson cannot be cowed by the intimidating tactics of the EFCC. We seize this opportunity therefore to, once again, reiterate our earlier call that the National Assembly should reject the proposed amendment to give EFCC powers to arrest without warrant as such would only give the Commission licence to harass innocent citizens under the guise of fighting corruption," the party said.