Not too long ago, the Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mr. Ola Olukoyede took a trip to Bayelsa State where he commissioned the newly built headquarters of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC in Yenagoa, the state capital and rounded off in Otuokpoti, Ogbia Local Government Area of the state, where he equally commissioned a newly built camp for internally displaced persons, IDPs in the state, also by NDDC.
Both infrastructures are eye-catchers in terms of their mass and modernity, however, there is the need to give some education and enlightenment, particularly to the uninformed on the crucial background that led up to the choice of Olukoyede by the NDDC as the commissioner of the projects.
This becomes a trifle necessary due to some bellyaching on the side of those who don’t grasp the backdrop issues or are simply ignorant or outrightly mischievous. Supreme among what should be noted is that the delivery of the projects was a happy ending for the EFCC in the light of its asset recovery efforts for the once corruption-ridden, odious and cesspool NDDC.
Following the aggravated corruption that vastly diminished the agency, the EFCC delved in and made financial recoveries of dizzying proportion over time from previous managements of the agency. Strong assurances of a new beginning in the agency by the succeeding Samuel Ogbuku management and his scaling of EFCC’s exacting integrity tests led Olukoyede to release some of the recovered funds to the new helmsman. And strictly for capital projects. Besides the proviso that the Commission will maintain oversight on the application of the released funds, the NDDC management was obligated to fill the EFCC in, at every turn of the projects’ implementation stages for fiscal discipline audit. This, and every other stipulation, necessary for ensuring a graft-free project execution, beginning from the projects’ conceptualization to the finish line, was observed with remarkable diligence by the NDDC, with every dime of the released funds expended by the agency with a sense of transparency and accountability to Olukoyede’s delight.
Persuaded and impressed that looted funds of the NDDC have finally been judiciously applied for the benefit of those they were originally meant for and delighted that the new steward of public resources in the agency has earned the respect of the EFCC by changing the nauseous narrative of the agency with a demonstration of will and capacity to make decisions that were anchored on fiscal discipline and in the best interests of the people and their communities, Olukoyede proudly accepted the privilege to commission the projects.
In every material sense, the commissioning of the projects by the EFCC Chairman was an action with which he spoke loudly that we all can be anti-graft ambassadors by simply threading the path of ethical behaviours.
Olukoyede’s joy with the diligent application of the recovered funds on the projects was as much, those of the Commission’s Secretary and custodian of the Commission’s assets, Mohammed Hammajoda and Gbolahan Latona, Director of EFCC’s Asset Forfeiture department, whom he flew in tow to Yenagoa for the joyous occasion.
He infringed absolutely nothing by identifying with projects, executed with stolen funds recovered by the Commission he leads, up to the terminal point of their commissioning. On the contrary, his action was an unambiguous message that the anti-corruption fight of the EFCC under his watch is much more about nourishing good governance, ensuring service delivery and public good than in putting people behind bars. His commissioning of the projects further spoke to the fact that the success or failure of the anti-corruption fight laid with how well or not we are prepared as individuals to do the right things in every position we find ourselves. It was a direct encouragement for all those leadership positions to rather choose integrity.
Therefore, it can only be a deliberate mischief, ignorance or outright foolishness that could drive anyone to think or imagine that Olukoyede’s demonstration of delight with the righteous application of the recovered funds by the NDDC translates to the forging of an incongruous fellowship of the hunter and the hunted or a perpetual endorsement of Ogbuku’s leadership.
The EFCC does not wish that anyone in a position of trust goes rogue and Olukoyede in the past one year and eight months has sufficiently demonstrated that he neither abides corrupt leaders, nor pulls his punches on anyone in position of trust that elects to puts self above service.
While it cannot be overemphasized that seeing that recovered assets are ethically deployed and for public good is the end point of EFCC’s asset recovery efforts under Olukoyede, he understands too well that recovered assets can be looted again, once they are returned to the state or entities or at just the very point, the Commission took its eyes off the ball, leaving him to start all over again with another rounds of investigation, prosecution, asset tracking and forfeiture processes, while the people, whom the funds were meant to address their needs, continue to hold the short end of the stick.
By maintaining such vigilance, the EFCC chairman seeks to guarantee that the hard-won resources are rechannelled to public services, infrastructure development, social programmes, and other initiatives that uplift people and communities.
At the Bayelsa event, Olukoyede left no one guessing about the impact of the trajectory of EFCC’s anti-corruption fight under his leadership on the image of the NDDC. “The essence of the fight against corruption is not to jail people. It is for it to impact the lives of Nigerians. So, it is my delight, my joy to be part of the transformational agenda of the NDDC; to be part of this life-transforming projects to the people of Niger Delta, people of Bayelsa State, people of Ogbia Local Government area of Bayelsa and particularly to the people of Otuokpoti. Could you have imagined somebody like me coming to sit down with the MD of NDDC, three or four years ago? It wouldn’t have been a possibility,” he said. Yes, it was not possible, but it became possible with his own efforts at reinventing the NDDC.
– ACE11, Tony Egbulefu is of the Media and Publicity Unit of the EFCC
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