Magu does not fit the bill

We find it difficult to buy the argument that the Buhari government should, for the third time, forward Mr. Ibrahim Magu’s name to the Senate for confirmation as chair of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). We believe that it is commonsense to look for another candidate with requisite forensic training, military discipline, intellectual comportment, and iron commitment to initiate, plan, and execute an effective anti-corruption campaign that aligns with the Buhari Administration’s self-imposed mandate. At any rate, we do not see that Ibrahim Magu possesses sufficient deep understanding and articulation of the corruption challenge nor the intellectual capacity to lead the agency in formulating long-term and efficient policies that will confront corruption from its root causes.

It is regrettable that Mr. Magu’s reactive and propaganda propelled exertions have somehow elevated the discussion to where an individual can become a magical representation of what is needed to give corruption a run for its money in Nigeria. Continuing with the current executive-legislature power-flexing, which the Presidency’s insistence on Magu as chair of EFCC reflects, inevitably slows down progress of the battle and guarantees decay in the country’s relationship with the outside world, through continued slow-down in her partnerships with ODAs, dry up of the flow of FDIs, and decline in diplomatic activities. It is in the larger interest of Nigeria that Mr. Magu immediately steps aside, especially as the security report on him by the Directorate of State Security shows that he is also not as clean as was hitherto promoted.

Our position that Magu gives way is not based on his prior work record as acting chair of the EFCC. It does not suggest that we do not appreciate the thinking that not pushing his nomination through will amount to giving in to the demands of a Senate many of whose members are under investigation or prosecution by the same man and who, accordingly, may have an interest in not seeing their traducer get a job that spells potential doom for them. We are also not unmindful that it is the constitutional responsibility of the President to select managers of federal commissions and agencies which the legislature has threatened by twice rejecting Magu’s nomination. All of this supports and strengthens the President in deciding to continue to back Mr. Magu for the job because not doing so would somehow make Mr. Buhari look weak before an assemblage of representatives with massive integrity deficiency. However, our position is based on these but on a much wider appreciation of what is required to effectively fight the war, which is diametrically opposed to standard resorts to post-hoc prosecution of economic and financial misfeasors.

Whenever the issue of fighting corruption in Nigeria is discussed in local conversations, the multilogue usually constellates around the catalytic role of EFCC in the battle. However, the EFCC has no such defining role conferred on it either by law or its modus operandi; it is not created as a proactive anti-corruption agency able to and capable of attacking corruption from its roots. This point is often glossed over in media celebrations of investigations and prosecutions that have become secured to propaganda efforts of succeeding governments in power.

Corruption in the public service needs to be attacked from its roots. Fighting public sector corruption from its roots implies a holistic, research-based approach to understanding and plugging the loopholes though which corruption takes place. It takes a greedy, deprived, unprofessional, and easily intimidated accounting officer for top political appointees to plot, execute, and make away with massive public funds. It takes the collaboration of not only the corrupt accounting officer (who is a civil servant) but also his or her subordinates to allow the country to continue to suffer the deleterious effects of massive financial hemorrhaging inflicted by amoral politicians in public office. Reforming the civil service and empowering civil servants is the beginning of wisdom in the prosecution of the war against corruption. Such a reform must be undergirded by administrative processes and rules, complete with opportunities for whistleblowing and administrative offensives that encourage careers of civil service anti-corruption champions, even as it short-circuits careers of those that aid the breach of financial transparency and accountability. This reform upgrades and tightens laudable welfare policies, especially those installed by the Obasanjo civilian administration, making it possible for civil servants to not only earn living wages but also be provided with opportunities for quality children education and family healthcare, single-digit mortgage loan facilities, pension and other incentives that make them look joyfully to the weekday labour.

It is our view that whoever is tapped by the President to head the EFCC will not be able to eradicate corruption or break the chain that holds it together. For such appointees, doing the job right has the potential to merely frighten new political appointees who may want to put their hands in the cookie jar. On the other hand, it also has the potential to propel a desperation by the deviously creative to manufacture antidotes against being caught in the enforcement web.

Editorial