Senator Defends FG on Ribadu

Apparently disturbed by controversy trailing the recent directive handed over to the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mallam Nuhu Ribadu to proceed on a one-year course at the Nigeria Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies, (NIPSS), Kuru, the Vice Chairman, Senate Committee on the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Senator Anthony Agbo has allayed fears that the nation's anti-corruption campaign could be thwarted with Ribadu’s exit.
Speaking with newsmen shortly after opening his constituency office in Abakaliki, yesterday, Agbo who represents Ebonyi North senatorial zone said[b] the removal of the EFCC chairman should not warrant the kind of controversy it is attracting, adding that rather than being worried, Nigerians should wait patiently to see who would be his successor.
While dismissing the insinuations in some quarters that Ribadu’s removal had some political undertones, Agbo made it clear that the NIPSS arrangement did not begin with Ribadu, and as such should not be celebrated.
Agbo said it was normal for the police authorities to send their senior officers to the Nigeria Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS) to enable them handle more demanding tasks.
"First and foremost, Ribadu is a policeman before becoming anything else and as such, he is answerable to the Inspector General of Police (IGP). If the police authority resolves to replace him with another person as the EFCC chairman, Nigerians should not see it as an attempt to halt the activities of the agency. When he is no longer there, the government would also transfer the same anti-corruption mandate to another person. We can only watch to see how the new person would fit into the EFCC shoes.
“The problem we are having now is because people see Ribadu as the beginning and end of EFCC. EFCC should not be seen as a personal thing. It is a body established by the law, so if government decides to put somebody else there, it should not be misconstrued to mean that Yar’Adua wants to truncate the anti-corruption battle. We still have other Nigerians who are capable of handling the Agency much better than Ribadu, what we simply need to do is to give those Nigerians the opportunity.
After all, those that drafted the law establishing the body did not have Ribadu in mind, but today, all of us are happy because he excelled,” he stated.[/b]

http://www.ngex.com/cgi-bin/frame/frameit2.plx?link="http://www.thisdayonline.com"

i will comment on the little that i know about this ongoing situation.
i will suggest that any nation should never sell her integrity to just one man no matter who this man may be or what this man may have done. human are human and they are capable of making mistakes and disappointing one another. i will not rely on any human being.
the focus should be on the integrity of the institution. the integrity or standard of an institution empowers the members. if you can confidently count on an institution, the replacement of any member shouldn't make any difference. i think efcc should be upgraded to an institution who focuses on serving nigeria with integrity and fairness. if this institution empowerment doesn't take place and made the main priority, i'm afraid to say that the same thing will happen again in future.
you must never capitalize on an integrity of any human being, this mistake was made in liberia and we are still paying for it up till today. corruption can not be fought by a man. it is much bigger than anyone. it is the duty of an institution backed by federal government and that is how it should be always. i also believe that nigeria did not establish this fact from the beginning and this is why people are very concerned that the end of this man is also the end of corruption war. this is very wrong and should not be this way.
check out this site and see how corruption rectification has been reinvented. it is not yet perfect but it is working.

http://www.liberiatransparency.org/Coalition%20mou.pdf

[b]What then is the big issue? I am not surprised that Kongi himself and a cream of the others jumped on the bandwagon to say Ribadu must be spared to allow him to continue the work, adjudged as good, he is doing. It is saying he does not need the experience of training and cross fertilisation that comes with meeting and exchanging views with diverse people. No, Kongi and the others are looking at the awon, the mask they cannot see the masquerade. They are saying that no-one else can direct the EFCC as efficiently as Ribadu is doing or that in the case of death or incapacity the outfit will grind to a halt.

Given the obvious falsity, is it normal that a good thing should grind to a halt? Isn’t it right that we grow a battery of other equally good personnel who will step into the shoes of those who want to leave or are compelled to leave on account of their utility to themselves or the state?
I have, in any case, not been impressed by the record of the Ribadu’s EFCC and I have not minced words.

It has been partial; dishonest, political and partisan. I have not forgotten his open empty threat in Ibadan. At the university, he mounted the podium and short of calling Adedibu and Alao-Akala vermins, he promised to ensure they would not rule good people of Ibadan. He gave the impression he had some damming dossiers on them. Thereafter the whip cracked down on his back and he simmered down like a soup in an earthen port. That is dishonest, political and partisan.
He probably must have forgotten his intimidation of Obasanjo’s political opponents - intra party- and otherwise. But nothing cultured may grow than the intimidation of Mike Adenuga. He invaded his place with a large body of operatives. He scared him that the latter moved his operational headquarters to London. Ribadu did not need to be told that Mike has a portfolio of businesses that is helping to stem unemployment in this country. He is, from oil exploration to oil marketing; from banking to telecommunication. Mike has gone outside this country to stamp his mastery on neighbouring Benin.

He has commissioned his Globacom network. Why should such an entrepreneur be hounded out of his country? Can we forget so soon that Mike’s intimidation was as a result of Abubakar Atiku’s prosecution? Ribadu might have done one or two good things, but he must have done a lot of bad ones. Now, we have created a monster that we cannot tame or have refused to tame. I see the way he has used the press and I am not impressed. And if he is as dispensable as our people are saying must we build our future on infallible man? Why can’t Nuhu go and perform his miracles somewhere else?

I hope it was not Ribadu who has fed the press with the close sources and reliable sources that they are quoting and insinuating his inevitability and threatening to quit the force? Nothing spoils a case as much as that. In the civil service you defer to the head to allow you the opportunity to rear your head. In today’s set-up, Mike Okiro is his professional boss and the president the commander-in-chief. He has already created bad blood between himself and the AGF.

And that has taken tact and deft handling to extricate the AGF. Now, why must the appointment of a single man cost so much dissension? I thought we were saying in the run-up to the election and the crucificaton of Atiku that it should not be up to the president to appoint such an important officer. In the hands of vindictive man, such as Obasanjo, there is no limit to the havoc he can be used for.

So much bad blood has been created in the polity on the Ribadu's matter that Ribadu will be advised to quietly go for his course, and on completion, await his next posting. It would not matter whether it is to the EFCC or somewhere else. He has enjoyed the limelight for so long that it may be difficult to operate otherwise. It will pay him to learn, as a lawyer, that you cannot convict without trial. He should go to learn to do more work and less talking.[/b]

http://www.vanguardngr.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=4071&Itemid=0

The name of my country is The Republic of Nigeria, not the republic of ribadu!