Olalekan Adetayo and Eniola Akinkuotu
The Federal Government has set up an account for the stolen funds it recovered in the last one year.
The Muhammadu Buhari-led government
revealed on Saturday that N78, 325,354,631.82; $185,119,584.61;
£3,508,355.46 and €11, 250 had been recovered from alleged looters, an
amount which adds up to over N115.7bn using the official exchange rate
of the Central Bank of Nigeria.
The funds were said to have been
recovered separately by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission,
the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation; Independent
Corrupt Practices and other related Offences Commission and the
Department of State Services.
Speaking with The PUNCH on
Sunday, the Chairman, Presidential Advisory Committee Against
Corruption, Prof. Itse Sagay, said an account had been set up for the
funds.
“An account has been set up for it and
at an appropriate time, what is going to be done with the money will be
made public. The amount that is available in that account will be
announced and what will be done with the money will be publicly
announced,” he said.
The committee chairman, however, said
the N1.9tn in cash and assets, which had been frozen by the Federal
Government, were still under legal contention and thus could not be
touched.
He added, “Regarding the funds frozen
under the interim forfeiture, the Federal Government can’t touch it for
now because certain cases have not been concluded and the forfeiture is
interim because technically, the court can order the release to the
owners if the occasion demands it but if it goes the other way, there
will be a permanent forfeiture order and that is when the properties
would accrue to the government and would therefore be used for the
benefit of Nigerians.”
Regarding the naming of alleged looters, Sagay said there was no legal impediment in shaming alleged thieves.
The renowned legal practitioner added that the decision not to name looters was more political than legal.
He stated that the decision not to name looters was made in a bid to encourage others, who had stolen, to return money.
Sagay said, “The way I see it, it is
more political than legal. It is not party politics but about conduct. I
believe the government feels that if you name names, those who are
about to come out and also bring out whatever has been looted, would
withdraw.
“On the legal side, I don’t see the
problem that is being talked about because once a person is going to be
charged to court for corruption or illegally acquiring resources, there
is no liability in announcing it.
“After all, we have been seeing the
names of all those accused and charged. So, the main reason is to
encourage others, who are still hiding their loot and speculating what
to do, to come out and hand over the loot so that the country can
recover more of what has been stolen.”
He added that the decision not to name
looters might also have been in a bid not to embarrass some Nigerians
who received government funds without knowing that the money was for
arms or that the money was stolen.
Some of those who fall under this
category, he explained, were newspapers who received money from the
Office of the National Security Adviser but later returned the funds.
He said, “There are some people who
actually received those assets and money without knowing that it was
stolen or whose knowledge of the source would be very difficult to
establish.
“So, if you are in a situation, where
you thought your political party had raised money legitimately and you
were given an amount for the purpose of campaign, then you may have a
strong case against any criminal charge like the newspapers, who have
received money, but you may be willing to return the money having found
out that it was illegitimately acquired.”
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has
concluded plans to spend the recovered looted funds on the development
of the nation’s infrastructure, The PUNCH has learnt.
The infrastructure on which the money would be spent includes roads and railways among others.
The Special Adviser to the President on
Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, disclosed this to one of our
correspondents in an interview on Sunday.
Adesina was asked how the Federal
Government planned to spend the recovered funds as indicated on Saturday
by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed.
Adesina said, “The President said it
sometimes ago in Kaduna that recovered money would be spent on the
development of infrastructure. The infrastructure includes roads and
railways among others.
“Nigerians can be assured that the money would be spent transparently and judiciously. They have nothing to fear.
“These funds would be spent to better the lives of Nigerians; this is what this government is committed to.”
The government’s target is to recover N386bn of looted fund this year.
This figure is stated in the 2016 Appropriation Act, which has been signed into law by Buhari.
The money, it was stated in the document, would be used to finance budget deficit.
Buhari had, last Monday, said he had
decided to stop talking publicly on the $2.1bn arms deal because doing
so might lead to a situation where the government would realise less
than the figure it wanted to recover.
The President spoke while hosting State House correspondents to a lunch as part of activities marking his one year in office.
“The most recent one which, we haven’t
recovered from, is the $2.1bn which was given by the government then to
the military to buy hardware to fight the insurgency which had taken
over part of the country and they just sat, just the way you are sitting
now, and shared the money into their own accounts. They didn’t even
bother,’’ the President stated.
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