By Emmanuel Nduka
The Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) has called on President Bola Tinubu to immediately sack the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Olanipekun Olukoyode, describing him as “grossly incompetent.”
In a statement on Tuesday, the CUPP said there was no excuse valid enough for committing those two errors of judgment by the EFCC on the day Yahaya Bello, the former Kogi Governor reportedly submitted himself to the Commission.
Heritage Times HT recalls that Bello had submitted himself to the Commission recently to answer to allegations against him, but was never held in custody as widely expected.
The CUPP statement was signed on behalf of the Coalition by 10 members of its Media, Strategy, Steering, Financial Contact and Mobilisation Committees and made available to newsmen on Tuesday in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city.
“It is with utmost disappointment that the Coalition of United Political Parties, CUPP, has viewed the ongoing drama between the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and the immediate past Governor of Kogi State, Yahaya Bello.
“We are aware that there has been some inexplicable back-and-forth between the EFCC and the former Governor for some months now, which has generated considerable public interest across Nigeria. Not a few Nigerians have been eager to see the day that the former Governor would be brought in to defend the allegations of humongous corruption allegations leveled against him by the antigraft agency.
“The Commission went all out to declare him wanted and put him on an international watchlist with the assistance of the INTERPOL that anywhere he was found he was to be promptly arrested.
“It is quite intriguing that the same man you have been hunting for, walked into your headquarters in Abuja and you let him walk away without as much as interrogating him under the pretext of some extremely ridiculous and flimsy excuses, one of which was that he came with a sitting Governor among others.
“A smart and intelligent head of a security agency like the EFCC would have tactically taken the former Governor into custody without much ado. But, clearly, the current leadership of the EFCC is totally clueless about the masterful art of intelligent policing. An agency like the EFCC is way above his training as a legal practitioner.
“When the current chairman of the EFCC was appointed, many legal pundits pointed out that the office of EFCC’s chairman should legally be occupied by a serving or retired senior police or any security agency officer. All those observations fell on the government’s deaf ears. The result has been the reversal of the gains made in the past on the anticorruption efforts of successive governments since the current leadership of the EFCC took office.
“If you couldn’t arrest the former Governor in the presence of his predecessor, why send armed operatives to the official abode of the same sitting Governor to start shooting in the middle of the night under the guise of you wanting to effect the arrest of someone who had earlier made himself available to you. That incident could have ended fatally with serious consequences for our democracy. It would have overheated the polity beyond control.
“There is no excuse valid enough in the world for committing those two errors of judgment by the EFCC. First, you let the man you declared wanted get away from your premises under a very suspicious gameplan.
“Secondly, you later mobilized at night to go and effect arrest of the same man. EFCC needs to come out and tell Nigerians what they are hiding and their real interest and intentions on this matter.
“Everything looks suspect on this matter. Since Mr Olukoyede took over as EFCC chairman, it has been one controversy or the other. If it is not about EFCC operatives committing gross human rights abuses against Nigerians, it would be arrogant disrespect for due processes and Court orders.
“With this kind of leadership, the EFCC will remain handicapped to effectively fight corruption. It is in this regard that we sincerely feel that, if President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is truly desirous of fighting corruption in the country, the current EFCC Chairman should be sacked immediately and a real professional senior security officer from any of the real security agencies be appointed as replacement to avoid this type of local and international embarrassments that this chairman has brought to the current administration and the country at large.
“His is a case of a square peg in a round hole. The geometry can never align.
“What happened two days ago makes the insinuation that the former governor is being persecuted now believable, rightly or wrongly. These people should stop playing politics with our collective sensibilities.
“Enough is enough!” the CUPP statement read in full.
Questionable Records, Qualification In Doubt
Nigerians had questioned the credibility of Tinubu’s choice to head one of the West African nation’s foremost anti-graft agency, shortly after he was appointed in 2023.
Heritage Times HT reports that Olukoyode did not grow in the ranks of the EFCC as a Regular Course, a prerequisite for the appointment as Chairman of the Commission.
Olukoyode’s only working experience at the Commission was the few years he spent while he served as Chief of Staff to former disgraced EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Magu, and as Secretary to the Commission from 2018 to 2023.
He had worked as a legal practitioner in a Law Firm in Lagos, reportedly owned by a former vice president of Nigeria. Sources also alleged that the former VP handpicked Olukoyode for the position of EFCC Chair.
Corroborating this, David Bwala, a lawyer and party chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), said Olukoyode’s private legal practice “years cannot be equated to the rank in law enforcement.”
Olukoyode was also reportedly indicted and suspended along with Magu and other top officials of the Commission in 2020 in the aftermath of the findings of an 11-man panel set up by former President Muhammadu Buhari to probe the Commission.
