Some of the governors sworn in on May 29 did not declare their assets and liabilities, contrary to the provisions of the country’s constitution. The Chairman, Code of Conduct Bureau, Sam Saba, who belatedly alerted the nation to the constitutional breach, however failed a critical test of leadership by not raising the alarm before they were sworn in. Such laxity only helps to entrench the growing culture of routine violation of the constitution.
There is no confusion as to when this should be done given the clarity of the constitution on the issue. In a recent interview, Saba said, “The people we are having problem with now are some governors….” He failed to name the culpable governors or the number involved. According to Section 185 of the 1999 Constitution as amended, “A person elected to the office of a governor shall not begin to perform the functions of that office until he has declared his assets and liabilities….” But many of the governors seem to have taken refuge in the ignorance that they have three months within which to do so.
Under the Fifth Schedule Part II of the Constitution, 16 categories of public officers, starting from the President, Vice-President, state governors and their deputies, the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justices of the Supreme Court, ministers, legislators, to all staff of any institution owned and financed by federal, state and local governments are mandated to declare their assets. Besides personal declaration of assets, the law also requires that a written declaration of properties of their children under the age of 18 years should be filed with the CCB.
For the avoidance of doubt, any violation of the Code of Conduct is punishable as espoused in the Fifth Schedule (Part 1) 18 (2). The punishments are to be meted out by the Code of Conduct Tribunal upon conviction of an errant officer. These sanctions include vacation of office, seizure or forfeiture of assets and disqualification from holding public office for a period up to 10 years.
To their credit, President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo had completed the Code of Conduct forms, which were submitted on March 28, a day to their inauguration, according to the Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity to the President, Garba Shehu. This obedience to the constitution is a course of action all public officers must follow.
Asset declaration is all about ensuring probity in public office; but the way it is being practised in Nigeria shows lack of seriousness. This accounts for the mind-boggling looting of public treasury since 1999. Nigeria’s rogue rulers lead the rest of African kleptomaniacs responsible for almost $2 trillion that left Africa illicitly since 1970. As of 2005, the Observer revealed that the total stock of private wealth of corrupt Africans held in low-tax havens was $11.5 trillion. Part of President Muhammadu Buhari’s wish-list during his United States visit is the assistance of President Barack Obama to locate and return about $150 billion believed to have been stolen by corrupt officials in the last decade.
Yet, many former governors had been dragged before the Code of Conduct Tribunal without any conviction, much the same way corruption cases handled by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission are being bungled. The recent collapse of a 15-year-old case against a top public officer for lack of diligent prosecution over alleged non-declaration of assets draws our collective attention to the absence of the political will or verve to use it as a moral instrument against the excesses of office holders.
Curbing public corruption should start with a credible asset declaration process. A well-designed and operational system of asset declarations should be an important element in the overall anti-corruption and integrity system of the Buhari government. Any individual that cannot declare his or her assets publicly is not fit to hold public office. President Harry Truman laid that foundation in the United States in 1951 when he said: “With all the questions that are being raised today about the probity and honesty of public officials, I think all of us should be prepared to place the facts about our income on the public record.” And that is exactly what public officials in open societies do. Even the African Union Convention on Preventing and Combating Corruption in 2003 told member states to “require all or designated public officials to declare their assets at the time of assumption of office during and after their term of office in the public service.”
The CCB and its leadership need to be reformed. The secrecy that has been allowed to be associated with asset declaration has not helped the country. As Buhari and Osinbajo’s promise to make public their declared assets within 100 days they assumed office, it is hoped that more public officers this time, will be persuaded to follow suit, unlike what happened in 2007 when the late President Umaru Yar’Adua did the same. Public access to asset disclosure information will contribute to the general transparency of the system. The National Assembly should activate the constitutional provision that requires the legislature to prescribe the way or manner the public could access assets declaration forms of public officers kept by the CCB.
