- Fix and deepen that institution, and everything would be added unto it
With the sack of Ibrahim Lamorde, some three months to the end of his tenure, the musical chairs over the headship of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the anti-graft agency Nuhu Ribadu pioneered, continues.
The new acting chairman is Ibrahim Magu, an assistant commissioner of police and another EFCC veteran, not unfamiliar with the agency’s tempest.
The iconic Mr. Ribadu, the portrait of the citizen as passionate and fearless anti-sleaze czar, is to EFCC sweet and sour.
Sweet: because even if institutions must run on rules and effective bureaucracy, a driven and passionate individual must, at the crucial pioneering juncture, epitomise and ingrain that vision.
And bitter: because in the seeming pursuit of personal glory — or in any case, the triumph of Ribadu’s drama, impulse and excitability — the first EFCC chairman succeeded in imposing his person on the anti-corruption war but subverting EFCC as an institution.
So, Mr. Ribadu both passed and failed in entrenching the EFCC dream, as a fearless and formidable graft-fighting agency. The test of that success: the fond wish that Mr. Ribadu would be in EFCC “forever”, which is impossible. And test of failure: a post-Ribadu EFCC was always a testy proposition. The present shell has therefore confirmed that worst nightmare.
Yet, Mr. Ribadu’s personal zest brought much respect and admiration for the agency. That attracted a harvest of foreign grants, which helped to build the agency’s capacity, in terms of internal and international training; and working tools and gadgets. Though the bulk of EFCC personnel came from the police, wonder kid EFCC was already showing its doddering dad how to earn respect, even reverence, as a crime buster. But all of that went with Mr. Ribadu.
Still, even at the height of its glory, what EFCC gained by solid technical training, it lost by excessive drama and politicisation of cases. While flowing with President Olusegun Obasanjo, ever eager to dramatise his anti-corruption war, the agency left itself open to not illegitimate charges of fighting the former president’s personal wars; and under the guise of fighting corruption, muscling presidential enemies, both within and outside his ruling party.
Post-Ribadu, when the presidential “body language” changed, the allegations also changed. Whereas EFCC was hyper-active fighting corruption, it became perceived as docile, or even complicit, in corruption cases. That bred a lot of scandals and rumours of scandals. That was the perception during the tenure of Mrs. Farida Waziri. The ouster of Mr. Lamorde too had come with a whiff of sleazy allegations.
But a villain should not be made of a good man. So, for the sake of Mr. Lamorde’s personal probity and the EFCC institutional integrity, these allegations should be probed. They should not be stopped simply because Mr. Lamorde has been unhorsed.
If he is found blameless, his integrity would have been restored; and the EFCC, which could have suffered institutional stain, were the allegations to be proven, would have earned well-deserved bragging rights. Even if he is found culpable, the EFCC would still have been rid of a rotten head.
Now, that the presidential “body language” has changed again under Muhammadu Buhari, who canvassed votes on a strong anti-corruption ticket, EFCC should not just change (as it seems to have) like some yo-yo. Rather, it should evolve a systemic and independent approach to its core duty. A president could be friendly or hostile; but EFCC should have the robust legal armour to do its work.
That then is the pressing historic duty of President Buhari. He should strengthen and deepen EFCC as an institution; and fortify it with requisite laws. That way, even when Buhari has long left the office, EFCC as a vibrant institution would help to build the corruption-free Nigeria of his dream.
