By Kehinde Osifisan
It is that time of the year again: the end of a year and the beginning of another; a brand New Year. This season is synonymous with celebrations and festivities. Goodbye, 2024. Welcome, 2025!
Since the media reflects the society, it is not unusual to see media organisations pick on an individual, innovation or phenomenon that has had the most impact on a people, nation or even the world at large in the outgoing year.
There is no gainsaying the fact that corruption is the biggest problem confronting us as a nation. It is visible at home, on the streets, in work/business places, both in private and public sectors. Corruption is at the roots of why systems, structures and processes are not working as they are in other climes or should be in Nigeria. To underscore the enormity of the scourge, former President Muhammadu Buhari declared, “If Nigeria does not kill corruption, corruption will kill Nigeria!”
In confronting the monster of corruption, several initiatives have birthed. One of such bold steps was the establishment of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in 2002, although it became operational in 2003.
Ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo-led administration founded the anti-corruption agency to combat the menace of advance fee fraud and public corruption that flourished under military rule. By the time Nigeria returned to democratic rule in 1999 after decades of military rule, it had become a pariah nation that needed to put structures in place to fight the menace of corruption and secure a place in the comity of nations.
Although it is not yet Uhuru, Nigeria is no longer where it used to be during the military rule, due to the giant strides of anti-corruption agencies like the EFCC in mitigating the plundering of public treasury.
As expected, institutions alone cannot build themselves. There is a place of leadership in the building of strong institutions. And so, a number of people had been appointed to the leadership of the anti-graft agency.
Since inception, EFCC has had five substantive chairpersons, and in-between, four acting chairpersons.But, out of them all, the current Chairman of the commission, Mr. Olanipekun Olukoyede stands tall and out of the pack.
In just 14 months in the saddle, the EFCC under Olukoyede, has achieved unprecedented breakthroughs in the fight against corruption. This goes beyond the investigation, arrest and prosecution of the hitherto untouchable ex-this or ex-that. It is more of the quantum of recoveries and assets forfeiture recorded than the personalities involved even though no one is spared under the new sheriff; whether you are member of the ruling party or not.
It is true that there had been cash recoveries and assets forfeiture in the past but at no time in the history of the commission’s or the nation’s anti-graft war that a total of 753 units of duplexes were forfeited as proceeds of corruption.
The 753 units of duplexes sit on a-150,500 square metre estate in Abuja. It is located at Plot 109, Cadastral Zone C09, Lokogoma District, Abuja.
Earlier, the Olukoyede-led EFCC secured the final forfeiture of all assets of a private university, NOK University, alongside Gwasmyen Water Factory, Gwasmyen Event Centre and Gwasmyen International Hotel, all in Kaduna State.
The commission was able to establish that a former director of finance and accounts at the Federal Ministry of Health built the University and other structures using the proceeds of unlawful activities traced to him.
As at October 2024 when Olukoyede marked 12 months in office, a record 3,455 convictions had been secured and monetary recoveries from October 2023
to September 2024 stood at
N248,750,049,365.52 (Two Hundred and Forty-Eight Billion, Seven Hundred and Fifty Millon, Forty- Nine Thousand, Three hundred and Sixty-Five Naira, Fifty-Two Kobo), $105,423,190.39 (One Hundred and Five Million, Four Hundred and Twenty-Three Thousand, One Hundred and Ninety Dollars, Thirty-Nine Cents) and £53,133.64 (Fifty-Three Thousand, One Hundred and Thirty- Three Pounds, Sixty-Four Pence); apart from recoveries in other currencies.
In what could be likened to a move to surpass one’s own records, the commission on the 10th of December, 2024 seized the air waves with the news of the arrest of 792 suspects for their alleged involvement in cryptocurrency investment fraud and romance scam!
The suspects were apprehended in a sting operation at their operational base, an imposing seven-storey edifice known as Big Leaf Building, on No.7, Oyin Jolayemi Street, Victoria Island, Lagos, following verifiable intelligence received by the Commission. The suspects included 192 foreign nationals – 148 Chinese, 40 Filipinos, two Kharzartans, one Pakistani and one Indonesian.
All these feats were not attained by some happenstance. They were as a result of clear vision born out of cognate experience, patriotism and exemplary leadership. “My priority as the Chairman of the EFCC is to use the fight against corruption to stimulate the economy”, Olukoyede told Tunes Newsmagazine in an interview.
Olukoyede came to the job prepared. He had served as Chief of Staff to a former Acting Executive Chairman, Mr. Ibrahim Magu, and was confirmed as Secretary to the Commission on November 28, 2018.
A legal practitioner and
Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), Olukoyede is also a regulatory compliance consultant with speciality in compliance management, corporate intelligence and fraud management. He had considerable insight and experience in the investigation and civil litigation of fraud and financial crimes.
For Olukoyede’s EFCC, asset recovery is pivotal in the fight against corruption, economic and financial crimes and a major disincentive against the corrupt and the fraudulent.
Addressing members of the Hon. Kayode Moshood Akiolu-led House of Representatives Committee on Anti-corruption, Olukoyede said, “If you understand the intricacies involved in financial crimes investigation and prosecution, you will discover that to recover one billion naira is war.
“So, I told my people that the moment we start investigation we must also start asset tracing because asset recovery is pivotal in the anti-corruption fight; and one of the potent instruments that you can deploy as an anti-corruption agency for an effective fight is asset tracing and recovery. If you allow the corrupt or those that you are investigating to have access to the proceeds of their crime, they will fight you with it.”
True to his words, those being investigated or prosecuted have been fighting back through simulated attacks and well-oiled campaign of calumny and litigations. One of such litigations against the commission and by extension the other anti-graft agencies was the lawsuit initiated at the Supreme Court against the EFCC by the Kogi State Government challenging the establishment and constitutionality of the EFCC.
About 15 other states reportedly joined Kogi State in the suit and asked that their grievances against the EFCC be consolidated.
Knowing the enormous powers and resources available to the states and the politically-exposed persons behind the suit, that was akin to holding the EFCC by the jugular until the apex court reoxygenated the commission in a landmark judgment delivered on the 15th of November, 2024, thrashing the suit and upholding the constitutionality of EFCC and other anti-graft agencies.
How can we forget the hide-and- seek game that the former Governor of Kogi State, Alhaji Yahaya Bello subjected the EFCC to? For eight months or so, the commission, the nation and indeed whole security architecture almost became a laughing stock in the eyes of the public and the comity of nations. It was a season of well-oiled devices, plots, schemes and surprises. Unfazed, Olukoyede vowed that he would resign his appointment if Bello escaped prosecution. Again, true to his words, Bello is having his day in court!
For the aforementioned feats and many more that time and space constraints would not permit me to capture, the EFCC Chairman, Mr. Olanipekun Olukoyede is my Man of the Year 2024!
. Osifisan is the Project Coordinator of Journalists Against Corruption (JAC), an Abuja-based Non-Governmental Organisation.
