The Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission, Professor Bolaji Owasanoye, SAN, has said President Muhammadu Buhari has a strong political will to fight corruption in Nigeria.
Owasanoye said this during the presentation of a paper titled, ‘Anti-Corruption Legislations, Policies and Practices: How they Align with UNCAC, OECD Anti-Bribery Convention and other Regional Conventions on Preventing and Combating Corruption,’ at the 26th INTERPOL Global Programme on Financial Crimes and Assets Recovery in Abuja recently.
The ICPC Chairman, who was represented by ICPC’s Director of Operations, Mr Akeem Lawal, stated that the Buhari regime was known for not interfering with the work of the anti-corruption agencies.
He also said the regime had been noted internationally to have a strong political will to fight corruption.
According to him, “Even if you are in his political party, he does not care. Go and answer the anti-corruption agencies. If you are free, you are free, if you are not, he doesn’t care. So he has a strong political will to fight corruption at this moment. Notwithstanding our internal challenges, we know this government to have the political will to fight corruption.”
He called for collective effort to ensure anti-corruption is institutionalised in Nigeria, adding that there was a need for strong institutions that would survive governments in order to make the fight against corruption a continuous one.
The Chairman also spoke on the need for principles, morals and good attitudes while stating that leaders had a role to play just like the followers.
“All of us are in this battle to ensure that corruption is brought to a standstill, and we do it in a manner that is logical and consistent with other international legislation and convention,” the ICPC boss declared.
The programme had in attendance officers from security agencies of different African countries.