Stakeholders on Monday, December 17, reiterated the need for the Federal Government to be sincere and resolute in the fight against corruption.
They made the call at a national summit organised by the African Centre for Media & Information (AFRICMIL) to mark two years of the whistleblowing policy introduced in December 2016. The stakeholders agreed that the only way to capture the interest of Nigerians in whistleblowing was for the government to be open and forthright.
In his welcome address, Chido Onumah, Coordinator of AFRICMIL said although the federal government had recorded some successes in the recovery of stolen public funds and assets through whistleblowing over the past two years, there were still so many issues begging for attention.
He emphasized that not until the policy is institutionalized, with well-defined legal framework, including the provision for meaningful protection of whistleblowers, much won’t be achieved in getting Nigerians to expose corruption.
He said, “We are certain that there are concerns that Nigerians have about the whistleblower policy: effective institutional and legal frameworks, reporting procedures, retaliation against whistle blowers, etc. More than anything else, it is important to safeguard the integrity of the process and protect whistleblowers. Whistleblowing as an instrument for tackling corruption can only survive where the safety of the whistleblower guaranteed.”
The chairman of the occasion, Femi Falana, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, noted that the federal government appeared to be dragging its feet in acting and investigating tips.
He revealed that it had been two years since he requested the Federal Ministry of Finance to recover not less than 200 billion dollars stolen funds, yet there has not been any update from the ministry.
“On March 8, 2016, I requested the Minister of Finance to embark on urgent and decisive measures to recover not less than $200 billion. Apart from assuring me, rather politely, that my request was receiving attention the detailed information contained in my letter has not been processed either by the Federal Ministry of Finance or Federal Ministry of Justice,” he said.
Hoping that the Presidential Panel on Recovery of Public Property (PPRP) acts on a petition he submitted in 2017, Falana stated that he highlighted the fact that Exxon Mobil had only paid 600 million dollars out of the 2.5 billion dollars fixed by the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) for the renewal of 3 oil blocks in 2009.
He said although the oil company had claimed to have paid the outstanding balance of $1.9 billion, there was no evidence to that effect. He urged the federal government to be proactive in the anti-graft war and take action as urgently as possible.
His words, “In view of the foregoing, we challenge the Federal Ministry of Finance to proceed to recover the huge funds highlighted in my letter. I can assure the federal government that I do not intend to demand payment of any percentage from the fund to be recovered based on the whistle that I have blown which has been ignored.”
Goodwill messages were delivered by Olayinka Aiyegbayo, representative of the Acting Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC); Lilian Ekeanyanwu, representative of the Executive Secretary of Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), Dr Gwimi Peters, representative of the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), and Saminu Amaddin who represented the Acting Chairman of EFCC.
The high point of the event was a panel discussion moderated by Maxwell Kadiri of Open Society Justice Initiative (OSJI).
The discussants included Mma Odi, Acting General Secretary of Alliance for Credible Elections (ACE); Musikilu Mojeed, Editor-in-Chief/COO of Premium Times; Frank Tietie, a lawyer; Idayat Hassan, Executive Director, Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) and Oluwole Ojewale, Assistant Programme Manager, Research and Development, CLEEN Foundation.
Affirming the urgent need for whistleblower protection, one of the panellists, Mma Odi, noted that the continuous harassment of people who blew the whistle at the initial stage had caused a setback for the policy.
According to her, “There’s need to bring life back to whistleblowing in the country because corruption is still blowing.”
Referencing #TheIkoyiGate, Idayat Hassan pointed out the danger of exposing the identity of whistleblowers which had been the case since the whistleblower policy was initiated.
“People who blow the whistle in institutions most times end up losing their jobs or either keep battling with series of psychological and emotional stress. AFRICMIL is doing its best, though the fact that the policy does not respect the privacy of whistleblowers is enough to discourage people from exposing corruption,” she said.
Reinforcing the need for a legal frame work, Oluwole Ojewale berated the National Assembly for not passing the policy into law yet.
“You can’t fight corruption with the help of just a policy,” he noted. “You need a law, a legal frame work. Two years and still no legal framework that helps to fight corruption. The implication is a new government, uninterested in the policy, could just wave it aside.”
Ojewale said it is ironical that it is only the federal government that professes to fight corruption while state governments are not mandated to join in the anti-graft war.
In his submission, Musikilu Mojeed noted that the attempt to criminalize whistleblowing must be addressed.
“People who gave tips on certain cash hidden somewhere shouldn’t be punished because anti-graft officials who got there couldn’t find the money. In most cases the cash had been moved,” he stated.
He said the lack of training of government officials on the whistleblowing policy had created a huge manpower gap.
