Olanipekun Faults Buhari’s Anti-corruption War, Says It’s Lopsided

• We have held people without charge, whilst others with similar allegations of corruption hanging on their necks continue to walk free   
• Calls for true federalism

By Victor Ogunje in Ado Ekiti

Erudite lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), yesterday said no tremendous achievement had been made in President Muhammadu Buhari’s war against corruption owing to the lopsidedness in the fight in the last two years.

He stated this yesterday at the Ekiti State University, Ado Ekiti while delivering a lecture entitled: “Breaking the Jinx, the Cyclical Nature of Nigeria’s Problems,” to mark the 22nd convocation ceremonies of the university.

The respected lawyer said: “President Buhari ran for office on the representation that he was incorruptible and that he would yield no ground in tackling corruption headlong. However, not much has been achieved as we approach the middle of the president’s term in office. 

“We seem to be fixated on the naming and shaming of people who have already been identified by successive governments for one reason or the other, whether genuinely or otherwise, rather than confronting headlong and holistically, the toxicity of corruption in the nation. We have held people without charge, whilst others with similar allegations of corruption hanging on their necks, continue to walk free and even occupying sensitive positions in government.

“The end result of a failure to adhere to rule of law is enthronement of dictatorship. Dictatorship itself breeds anarchy, and when anarchy is enthroned, we enter a sphere described by sociologists as a state of anomie and a regime of anomy. No society wishes it in the first place, but gradually, it inches forward unnoticed when rule of law is discarded, and rule of man is enthroned. It happens when citizens applaud high-handedness, and when any crave for vengeance replaces due process. A fertile zone for it to germinate is also where the citizenry either keeps quiet, advertently or inadvertently, or even ignorantly or where they are afraid of expressing their views.

“We have to be very careful in the way and manner we pronounce and crucify people in this country, without trial, and without affording them the right to be heard. The right to fair hearing is inalienable, given to man by God, right from the time of creation. God gave Adam and Eve the right to fair hearing before He passed judgement on them. 

“The acting Chairman of the EFCC was quoted by several national dailies as saying that he was not given fair hearing by the DSS before he was condemned of wrongdoing by them. I sympathise with Mr. Ibrahim Magu and I agree entirely with him that he ought to have been given fair hearing. But I want to plead that every tier of Government in this country, including agencies of government, including also the EFCC and the DSS, should give Nigerians the right to fair hearing in obedience to the clear provisions of the Constitution, as well as the right bequeathed to man by God. Annexed to the right to fair hearing, is also our duty, whether as government or people, to obey court orders under the doctrine of the Rule of Law.

“We cannot also hide under the pretext that we are fighting corruption or any particular vice, in refusing to obey any court order, whether in civil or criminal cases, and also including others where courts have directed that citizens should be released on bail. The Supreme Court succinctly summarized the imperative of obedience to the rule of law.” 

Olanipekun said the Nigerian government, to a very large extent, had been reactive and not proactive in the fight against corruption: “In my view, Nigeria arrives at the scene of corruption after the deed has been done, after the horse has bolted from the stable. No efforts have been devoted to building strong institutions and systems which make it impossible for corruption to be perpetrated and perpetuated or which detect same and quickly nip it in the bud.

“The virus called corruption has entrenched itself in virtually every area of our national life. Over the last decade, Nigeria has consistently ranked high on the Global Corruption Perception Index of Transparency International, as one of the most corrupt countries in the world; in fact, the country was ranked as the 136th most corrupt country amongst 145 countries for year 2016 (nine countries short of being the most corrupt). 

“This leads me to another virulent manifestation of corruption in our country, the corruption of public institutions and agencies. I dare say today that corruption is present in one form or the other in our public institutions. The civil service, security agencies, specialised agencies of government, Customs, Immigration, court registries, land allocation and processing agencies, even our universities are not left out.

He said Nigeria as a country, had simply been pretending to be combating corruption by not tackling the problem from the root and the very foundation.