Lamorde: EFCC Made 1,000 Convictions in 10 Years

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has recorded 1,000 convictions since its formation 10 years ago.

The Chairman of the Commission, Mr Ibrahim Lamorde, represented by Mr Chile Okosoma, revealed at this year’s International Anti-Corruption Day yesterday in Abuja that the Commission had been relentless in their fight against corruption in both ordinary and high-profile cases.

“In 10 years of existence, EFCC has recorded over a thousand convictions, and over 90 convictions this year. This is quite
heartwarming, giving the constraints that permeate the entire judicial process where cases drag endlessly,” he said.

In its presentation, the associated Code of Conduct Bureau’s acting Chairman, Barrister Yakubu Tuktur said that the bureau received 96 petitions for breaches of the code of conduct by public servants in the last one year, of which 24 were still under investigation, seven were under legal review, 10 had been referred to other agencies and 15 had been closed.

Represented by the bureau’s secretary, Mr Sani Bako, Tuktur said that CCB had verified almost everybody in their highest ‘risk groups,’ which are the offices were breaches were most likely and included governors, their deputies, ministers and commissioners in the country. Procurement and accounting officers were also included in the risk group.

“Our mandate covered from level one up to the President, but because of paucity of funds we are not able to attend to everybody. The department prosecuted 303 cases at the Code of Conduct Tribunal, obtained four convictions, six cases were discharged and acquitted while 293 cases are currently adjourned,” he said.

“We were able to visit 130 agencies and 21 federal ministries for compliance training programmes during the period under review. We were also able to train 185,234 officers on sensitisation.”