Hon Aminu Tambuwal
House of Representatives Speaker, Hon Aminu Tambuwal, Monday gave a damning verdict on the prosecution of anti-graft war by President Goodluck Jonathan. He criticised Jonathan's handling of corruption cases, saying 'the president's body language' seems to be encouraging corrupt practices in the country.
Tambuwal, fielding questions from reporters in Abuja after delivering a lecture on 'Role of the legislature in the fight against corruption in Nigeria,' expressed dissatisfaction with the way the Jonathan administration has been handling high profile corruption cases.
He delivered the lecture at a one-day roundtable, organised by the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), to mark the international anti-corruption day.
The speaker explained that actions taken by the federal government in respect of corruption cases investigated by the National Assembly have undermined the nation's commitment to fight graft.
He said the federal government's dithering in the fight against corruption, especially when very influential Nigerians are affected, had shown the lack of commitment of the administration to tackle the menace.
"Take the (fuel) subsidy probe, the pension (scam), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) probe and recently the bulletproof car cases.
After the House of Representatives did a diligent job by probing and exposing the cases, you now see something else when it comes to prosecution.
"In some cases, you have the government setting up new committees to duplicate the job already done by the parliament. Take the bulletproof cars case, the NSA, with all the security challenges confronting the country, should not be burdened with a job that can best be handled by the anti-corruption agencies.
"The government has no business setting up any administrative committee in a case that is clear to all Nigerians. What the president should have done was to explicitly direct the EFCC to probe the matter. With such directives coming from the president, I am sure we still have good people in EFCC who can do a good job.
"By the action of setting up different committees for straightforward cases, the president's body language doesn't tend to support the fight against corruption," he added.
In one of the cases cited by the speaker, the House had tasked its Committee on Aviation to probe the purchase of two BMW bulletproof cars by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) allegedly for the use of Minister of Aviation, Ms. Stella Oduah.
The committee, after taking testimonies from the ministers and other officials involved in the transaction as well as the motor dealer, had submitted its report to the House.
Although details of the report were not made public, it was gathered that the committee recommended the sack of the minister for authorising the procurement of the vehicles at a cost of N255 million, which is above her approval limit.
Besides, the anti-graft agencies such as the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) had signified their intentions to probe the procurement of the two cars.
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