CSOs Express Concern Over Tinubu’s Commitment To War Against Corruption
Some Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in the country have expressed serious concern over President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s commitment to fight corruption, warning that the administration does not have much time to waste.
They therefore tasked the President and the National Assembly to deepen the fight against corruption by enacting a law to secure whistleblowing in Nigeria.
The CSOs, which included the Progressive Impact Organization for Community Development (PRIMORG), African Centre for Media & Information Literacy (AFRICMIL), and the International Center for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), urged the executive and legislative arms of government to provide a legal impetus for whistleblowing.
Unfortunately, the 9th National Assembly (NASS) failed to pass Whistleblower bills into law until their term elapsed.
The CSOs said that the request for a Whistleblower law was coming on the heels of a recent corruption investigative report by the ICIR which revealed that a good number of Nigerians have stopped reporting cases of corruption and looted funds due to fear of victimization and the government’s non-action on suspects.
AFRICMIL’s Programme Manager, Godwin Onyeacholem, led the call for passage of whistleblowing into law during PUBLIC CONSCIENCE, an anti-corruption radio programme produced by PRIMORG in Abuja.
Onyeacholem said there was the need for the Federal Government to take the fight against corruption seriously thus, counselled President Tinubu to maximize the full potential of whistleblowing to recover state-owned resources stolen by public officeholders.
He said; “Once you have a whistleblowing law, then people will have that confidence that once they make a disclosure, there is a framework to protect them, but in a situation of a lapse in law to protect you, it’s a disincentive.
“This country is owing close to N80 trillion. No government needs more money than Tinubu’s administration, one of the ways to block the leakages in government is to encourage people to make disclosures, and then you act; this is because one of the things that also discourages whistleblowing is that people whom those whistles have been blown against not being punished.”
Towing the same line, an investigative journalist at ICIR, Olugbenga Adanikin, called on the government to provide a legal framework for whistleblowing to help in the fight against corruption in Nigeria.
This was as Adanikin lamented the growing number of Nigerians unwilling to report corruption, adding that there are honest and passionate public servants who are deterred from reporting corruption because of persecution and reprisal attacks from suspects.
According to him; “Once civil servants are sure that when they blow the whistle on corruption, the culprits are brought to book, and their lives are protected, they will be encouraged to do it.”
He therefore tasked the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), to protect whistleblowers’ identities and adopt new strategies in their constitutional obligation to fight corruption.
He further said; “EFCC and ICPC can come up with brilliant initiatives of having covert operations. They can even partner with the DSS. Since we have DSS across the country, they can help with that covert operation; and shield the identity of the whistleblowers.
“Nigerian Journalists must promote the profession’s ethics, journalists must work to promote the public interest, and that means we are working not for our gain,” Adanikin stated.
On her part, PRIMORG’s Programme Manager, Dr. Adaobi Obiabunmuo, challenged President Tinubu and the members of the National Assembly to deepen whistleblowing and protection with a law.
She said; “For us at PRIMORG, we urge the 10th National Assembly and President Bola Tinubu-led executive to ensure that there is legislation for whistleblowing in Nigeria soon enough”.
The whistleblowing policy was launched in Nigeria on December 21, 2016, to encourage people to voluntarily disclose information about fraud and other forms of corruption or theft.
