Buhari pushes for ethics, integrity; hears how N2.67b school feeding programme money, others ended in private bank accounts

On a day and at an event President Muhammadu Buhari was strongly pushing for a restoration of national ethics and integrity, many top government officials present at the Council Chambers of the Presidential Villa for the launch of the National Ethics and Integrity Policy were regaled with the scandalous story of how N2.67 billion meant for the government school feeding programme, and other huge sums ended up in private bank accounts.

The President on Monday recalled that, “as military Head of State, I fought corruption headlong and held public officers who abused their office or misused public funds to account. Furthermore, I introduced the War Against Indiscipline (WAI), one of whose cardinal objectives was promotion of our cherished culture of ethical conduct, integrity and hard work.

“I recognized in 1984 as I do even more now that corruption poses a clear danger to Nigeria, so, we cannot relent in efforts to eradicate it from our society. As I have often reminded Nigerians, ‘If we do not kill corruption, corruption will kill Nigeria.’”

He declared that the National Ethics and Integrity Policy “projects government’s aspiration for rediscovery of our cherished traditional ethical values of honesty, integrity, hard-work, truth and justice, unity, faith, and consideration for one another irrespective of status or background. Corruption and corruptive tendencies are abhorrent to these core ethical values.”

But the Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Bolaji Owasanoye, in his keynote address at the second national summit themed, ‘Together Against Corruption and Launch of the National Ethics and Integrity Policy’, said under open treasury portal review carried out from January to August 15, out of 268 ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) 72 of them had cumulative infractions of N90 million.

He said while 33 MDAs gave explanations that N4.1 billion was transferred to sub-TSA, N4.2 billion paid to individuals had no satisfactory explanations.

“We observed that transfers to sub-TSA was to prevent disbursement from being monitored,” Owasanoye said.

“Nevertheless, we discovered payments to some federal colleges for school feeding in the sum of N2.67 billion during lockdown when the children are not in school, and some of the money ended up in personal accounts. We have commenced investigations into these findings.”

There were other mind-blowing infractions:

▪︎ ICPC discovered over N2.5 billion appropriated by a deceased senior civil servant in the Ministry of Agriculture for himself while in office.

▪︎ N16 billion from the Ministry of agriculture paid into individual accounts for non-official purposes.

▪︎Assets recovered in the Ministry to include 18 buildings, 12 business premises and 25 plots of land.

At the summit to mark the 20th  anniversary of the establishment of the anti-corruption agency, President Buhari reiterated his belief that progress could only be achieved in the delivery of dividends for the citizenry when the arms and tiers of government work together.

“I believe that it is when the three arms and the three levels of government work together that government will be enabled to serve the country. We will also see the positive impact of our efforts reaching all and sundry across the country.”

According to the President, “bearing this critical factor in mind, I am happy that the theme of this year’s Summit by ICPC is, TOGETHER AGAINST CORRUPTION. I am aware that this theme derives from the theme of our 60th anniversary celebration. Together as a nation, as a people, the three arms and three tiers of government working together, we can attack corruption and realize the vast potentials of our country.”

President Buhari reiterated his earlier call on the judiciary to undertake reforms that will fast-rack delivery of justice for the common good.

 “We need to deploy resources to address our common needs rather than the greed of a callous few. We need a corruption-free public sector to achieve this transformation; we need a judicial system that dispenses justice without undue delay and technicality.

“We need laws and legal system to be reformed to deliver justice to every citizen without regard to status and finally we need ethical re-orientation of the people to achieve this goal. When we work together against corruption we can defeat it.”

He emphasized that enlightening Nigerians on preventive measures remains the key component in fighting corruption and commends ICPC in this regard.

“I wish to reiterate the role of preventive measures, public education and enlightenment against corruption. This government through the Open Treasury initiative, TSA, GIFMIS, BVN and many more is implementing different corruption prevention measures to track and retain government revenue for the use of the people.

“I commend the ICPC for its enforcement and prevention measures including system review of capital and personnel budget, regular analysis of the Open Treasury platform, enforcement action against diversion and mismanagement of public funds, working with the Federal Inland Revenue Service to increase the number of companies and persons within the tax net, tracking of constituency project budget utilization for the benefit of ordinary Nigerians and its monitoring of implementation of budget by the Executive in key sectors like Agriculture sector.”

Apart from presenting publications by the Commission, President Buhari also commended and presented awards to Opeyemi Peter Adeboye, Chikezie Favour and Matilda Daniels winners of the ICPC Youth Music and Essay Competitions on promotion of anti-corruption values as well as  the 2020 Public Service Integrity Awardees; CSP Francis Osagie Erhabor of the Nigeria Police and Hamza Adamu Buwai of the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade & Investment who demonstrated the will to look away from graft and corruption.

He told them, “I congratulate all the awardees. Even though COVID-19 has not permitted the kind of ceremony that you deserve, Nigeria is proud of you. You are a pride to your families, institutions and to Nigeria.”

There were goodwill messages from the Senate President Ahmed Lawan,  Chief Justice of Nigeria, Ibrahim Tanko Mohammed, Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State, Minister of Justice and Attorney General Abubakar Malami (SAN) and United Nations Resident Coordinator Edward Kallon. The UN Coordinator particularly said the level of transparency in fighting corruption under President Muhammadu Buhari was ‘unequivocal.’