The Socio-Economic Rights and
Accountability Project (SERAP) has written to the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB)
to make public, asset declaration submitted to the bureau by successive
presidents and governors from 1999 to 2019.
This comes after the Code of
Conduct Tribunal (CCT) found Walter Onnoghen, suspended chief justice of
Nigeria (CJN), guilty of false declaration of assets.
In a freedom of information (FoI)
request signed by Kolawole Oluwadare, SERAP’s deputy director, the civil
society organisation asked the CCB to urgently provide information on asset
declaration submitted by the public officials.
“While we welcome the judgment by
the Code of Conduct Tribunal on Justice Walter Onnoghen, we now urge the CCB to
extent its mandates to enforce constitutional provisions on asset declarations
by public officers to cover elected officers and to vigorously pursue the
prosecution of any such officers who use their powers either as presidents or
state governors over public funds to enrich themselves,” the letter read.
“While judicial corruption is
bad, the level of corruption involving many politicians since 1999 and the
entrenched culture of impunity of perpetrators is equally appalling. Publishing
the asset declarations of elected public officers since the return of democracy
in 1999 to date would improve public trust in the ability of the Bureau to
effectively discharge its mandates. This would in turn put pressure on public
officers like presidents and state governors to make voluntary public
declaration of their assets.
“SERAP is concerned that many
politicians hide behind the fact that members of the public do not have access
to their asset declarations to make false declarations, and to cover up assets
illegally acquired in corruption or abuse of office. The CCB can use the
opportunity presented by the Onnoghen judgment to increase the accountability
of politicians through the asset declaration provisions if it is not to be
accused of witch-hunting the judiciary.”
SERAP is specifically seeking
information on “details of asset declarations by successive presidents and
state governors between 1999 and 2019, including details of declarations made
immediately after taking offices and thereafter, and for those who have left
public offices, at the end of their term of office.”
Standing on the provisions of the
FoI act, 2011, SERAP said it would take appropriate legal action against CCB if
it fails to provide the information within 14 days.
It is not clear if the act
establishing the CCB mandates it to make publish asset delegation of public
officials, there are provisions, however, for the bureau to take and retain
custody of assets declarations.
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