Kalu, EFCC & the re-branding project
By Odimegwu
Onwumere
What many Nigerians have said that is the renewed effort of
the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) to re-assess the ex-Governor
of Abia State, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu over alleged money impropriety while in
office is better said is a renewed effort of the commission to insult and
molest Nigerians.
The commission has bent on arresting and re-arresting the
good-natured Kalu without any evidence to show that he really committed the
‘crime’ which EFCC has been celebrating for years, without allowing the man be.
This celebration by the EFCC has only achieved the aim of the script of those
it is playing – Bringing the name of Kalu to the mud – and not actually bringing
corruption to standstill. That was not supposed to be.
The cynicism the EFCC is exhibiting against Kalu is one in a
million of how not to fight crime if Nigerians should dig deeper into the case
of the Kalu’s ‘crime’. In earnest, what
the EFCC is doing is a war of slow-destruction against Kalu, but has chosen a
hoodwinking method against the general public that it is fighting a war against
corruption.
Nigerians could attest to the unilateral way the commission
was formed. Between 1999-2007, it was used by the president within the period
mentioned to ‘shut-up’ any perceived opposition. And even till date. People
were molested and haunted for ‘crime’ they never committed and without anything
to show for all the money the EFCC also celebrated on the pages of the
newspapers that it recovered from certain quarters. This could be the reason
one remanded Banker has been shouting from the custody recently, saying, “They
are looting my loot.” And one wonders who the looters of her loot are. Is EFCC
corrupt?
The EFCC is bloated everyday with the hard earned name of
Kalu brought to disrepute. The EFCC always use wide coverage by the media to
impress Nigerians while molesting Kalu. Today, many Nigerians are not impressed
about this. Nigerians believed that this act by the agency is just a charade.
You don’t sentence someone to prison before arraigning the person in a court.
Apart from Kalu whom many Nigerians have told the EFCC to
prove itself right by providing documents that show that he really mismanaged
the touted fund, they knew that the commission has just been celebrating
mediocrity. What even the Federal Government (FG) has not realized is that the
EFCC is giving the country a bad image before the international community. It
is always celebrating long lists of imaginary Nigerian corrupt persons without
any prove to back its lists. This behaviour is very bad, especially in recent
times when Nigeria had launched a “Good people, Great Nation” re-branding
campaign, yet the teleguided EFCC is sending message across the world that
corruption is imminent in Nigeria. But this is untrue. Those Nigerians on the
EFCC’s lists are not corrupt, except the commission would prove otherwise.
Such eyeservice practice by the EFCC is dubious. Its war
against corruption from its inception has setback the FG’s image laundering of
Nigeria abroad. Every Nigerian is seen and deemed as a corrupt person anywhere
in the world just because the EFCC has been sending message of ‘corruption
imminent in Nigeria’ across to the countries of the world. And the commission is
always happy generating controversy that has plunged the anti-corruption war in
Nigeria. If the FG really wants to help Nigeria, it should put an end the
commission. A panel had even recommended this.
Because of how the EFCC has made Nigeria be rated in the
comity of nations, it could be recalled that Nigeria was in the 2010 Corruption
Perception Index of the arguably Transparency International and was listed as
one of the most corrupt nations in the world. Why? Because of the EFCC’s
abracadabra to safe its continued efforts to stay as EFCC whereas the image of
Nigeria is rubbished and tainted.
Against that influence, the Human Rights Watch, a US-based rights
organisation, painted EFCC as a toothless bulldog, saying, “Despite its
promise, the EFCC has fallen far short of its potential and eight years after
its inception is left with a battered reputation and an uncertain record of
accomplishment.”
The case here is should the EFCC go unpunished for always
painting the image of Nigeria black with its barking action, without motion?
Nigerians have been beaten several times by this EFCC and they are shy,
therefore the agency should be swept under the carpet. It has failed to do a
proper job of investigation before molesting Kalu. And Nigerians are not taking
this with a pinch of salt. Hence, is Kalu really that corrupt or is it not the
EFCC that is truly corrupt? EFCC has a poor criminal investigative unit to
fight corruption and should shut-up.
Straight away, the EFCC lags in putting itself to order before
coming to the public to talk about who is corrupt or not corrupt, and oblivious
that it always brings itself to the public gallery for people all over the
world to laugh at.
Corruption is not hegemonies. The EFCC could be corrupt and
should stop massaging its ego, by painting Nigerians as a corrupt people. There
is no proposal or far-reaching judicial reforms because of the EFCC on how to
fast-track the trial of Kalu that would work.
The FG should henceforth audit EFCC. Without mincing word,
EFCC has failed. Does it not take absolute morality to expose absolute
immorality again? This EFCC should remove its speck before coming to equity. If
it has no work to do, it should then let Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu be.
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