Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu, has said the commission intervened in
the general elections to prevent the moneybags from determining the
emergence of irresponsible politicians at the polls.
Magu stated
this yesterday in Kampala, Uganda, during the ongoing Ninth Commonwealth
Regional Conference for Heads of Anti-Corruption Agencies in Africa.
He
disclosed that the agency secured 189 convictions in 2017 and recovered
N437 billion, $98 million €7 million and £294,000 respectively.
On
inter-agency relationships, Magu said: “The EFCC consistently strives
to assist other government agencies in tackling corruption. This quest
in 2018 saw the commission assist the Federal Inland Revenue Service
(FIRS) to recover N6.3b in unremitted tax revenues.
“It
equally assisted in the recovery of N542m for the Asset Management
Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON). The Commission recovered N1.6b; N1.76b
and N1.030b for AMCON, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)
and FIRS from January to April, 2019.”
In his paper titled:
Creative Initiatives In The Fight Against Corruption In Nigeria, Magu
noted that the EFCC’s intervention during the Presidential and National
Assembly elections of March 9 and the gubernatorial and states Assembly
polls on March 23 paid off with positive results.
He disclosed
that huge cash in different denominations were seized from politicians
and their associates, adding that arrested perpetrators of voters
inducement were being prosecuted, just as a councilor from Gombe State
has been convicted.
“For the first time in the history of
electioneering in Nigeria, operatives of the Commission were deployed to
monitor polling stations and collation centres to discourage vote
buying.
“The efforts culminated in some cash seizure and arrests.
Some of those arrested have been prosecuted and convicted. The presence
of EFCC operatives, according to some of the election monitors, was a
major deterrence to dubious politicians and their associates,” he
stated.
