Nobody will be spared in anti-corruption fight – Osinbajo

.Says past looting of nation’s resources must be accounted for

.’FG has added $500m to Sovereign Wealth Fund’

The President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government has insisted that under its fight against corruption, all those accused of corruption would be brought to justice without minding whose ox is gored.

The acting President, Professor Yemi Osunbajo, SAN, who stated this in his Democracy Day speech in commemoration of the second year of the Buhari’s administration on Monday in Abuja, vowed that the looting of public resources that took place in the past few years has to be accounted for.

Osinbajo equally said that the present administration has taken very seriously its promise to save and invest for the future, even against the backdrop of our revenue challenges, stressing that the government has, in the last two years, added US$500m to the nation’s Sovereign Wealth Fund and US$87m to the Excess Crude Account.

The current administration, the acting President maintained, is determined to ensure that anyone who uses violence, or carries arms without legal authority is apprehended and sanctioned.

Osinbajo pointedly stated that funds appropriated to build roads, railway lines, and power plants, and to equip the military, that had been stolen or diverted into private pockets, must be retrieved and the culprits brought to justice.

While agreeing with the view in some quarters that the process of fighting corruption in the country is slow, the acting President said that the good news for justice is that the country’s law does not recognise a time bar for the prosecution of corruption and other crimes.

He maintained that the current administration will not relent in its efforts to apprehend and bring corruption suspects to justice.

Osinbajo, a Professor of Law, said: “In the fight against corruption, we have focused on bringing persons accused of corruption to justice. We believe that the looting of public resources that took place in the past few years has to be accounted for.

“Funds appropriated to build roads, railway lines, and power plants, and to equip the military, that had been stolen or diverted into private pockets, must be retrieved and the culprits brought to justice.

“Many have said that the process is slow, and that is true, corruption has fought back with tremendous resources and our system of administration of justice has been quite slow.

“But the good news for justice is that our law does not recognise a time bar for the prosecution of corruption and other crimes, and we will not relent in our efforts to apprehend and bring corruption suspects to justice.

“We are also re-equipping our prosecution teams, and part of the expected judicial reforms is to dedicate some specific courts to the trial of corruption cases. We are also institutionalising safeguards and deterrents.

“We have expanded the coverage of the Treasury Single Account (TSA). We have introduced more efficient accounting and budgeting systems across the Federal Government. We have also launched an extremely successful Whistleblower Policy.

“The Efficiency Unit of the Federal Ministry of Finance has succeeded in plugging leakages amounting to billions of naira, over the last two years. We have ended expensive and much-abused fertilizer and petrol subsidy regimes.

“We have taken very seriously our promise to save and invest for the future, even against the backdrop of our revenue challenges, and we have in the last two years added US$500m to our Sovereign Wealth Fund and US$87m to the Excess Crude Account”.

The acting President equally pointed out that more recent threats to security such as the herdsmen clashes with farmers in many parts of the country sometimes leading to fatalities and loss of livelihoods and property have also preoccupied our security structures.

He said: “We are working with State governments, and tasking our security agencies with designing effective strategies and interventions that will bring this menace to an end.

“We are determined to ensure that anyone who uses violence, or carries arms without legal authority is apprehended and sanctioned”.

Continuing, Osinbajo said: “We have taken very seriously our promise to save and invest for the future, even against the backdrop of our revenue challenges, and we have in the last two years added US$500m to our Sovereign Wealth Fund and US$87m to the Excess Crude Account.

“This is the very opposite of the situation before now, when rising oil prices failed to translate to rising levels of savings and investment.

“Admittedly, the economy has proven to be the biggest challenge of all. Let me first express just how concerned we have been, since this administration took office, about the impact of the economic difficulties on our citizens.

“Through no fault of theirs, some companies shut down their operations, others downsized; people lost jobs, had to endure rising food prices. In some States civil servants worked months on end without the guarantee of a salary, even as rents and school fees and other expenses continued to show up like clockwork.

“We have been extremely mindful of the many sacrifices that you have had to make over the last few years. And for this reason this administration’s work on the economic front has been targeted at a combination of short-term interventions to cushion the pain, as well as medium to long term efforts aimed at rebuilding an economy that is no longer helplessly dependent on the price of crude oil”, he stressed.

The acting President recalled that the present administration of Buhari outlined three specific areas for our immediate intervention on assumption of office: these were Security, Corruption and the Economy.

He said, “In the Northeast of our country, the terrorist group, Boko Haram, openly challenged the sovereignty and continued existence of the state, killing, maiming, and abducting, causing the displacement of the largest number of our citizens in recent history. Beyond the North East they extended their mindless killings, as far away as Abuja, Kano and Kaduna.

“But with new leadership and renewed confidence our gallant military immediately began to put Boko Haram on the back foot.

“We have restored broken-down relations with our neighbours, Chad, Cameroon and Niger – allies without whom the war against terror would have been extremely difficult to win.

“We have re-organised and equipped our Armed Forces, and inspired them to heroic feats; we have also revitalised the regional Multinational Joint Task Force, by providing the required funding and leadership.

“The positive results are clear for all to see. In the last two years close to one million displaced persons have returned home.

“106 of our daughters from Chibok have regained their freedom, after more than two years in captivity, in addition to the thousands of other captives who have since tasted freedom.

“Schools, hospitals and businesses are springing back to life across the Northeast, especially in Borno State, the epicentre of the crisis. Farmers are returning to the farms from which they fled in the wake of Boko Haram.

Finally, our people are getting a chance to begin the urgent task of rebuilding their lives.

“Across the country, in the Niger Delta, and in parts of the North Central region, we are engaging with local communities, to understand their grievances, and to create solutions that respond to these grievances adequately and enduringly.

“President Buhari’s New Vision for the Niger Delta is a comprehensive peace, security and development plan that will ensure that the people benefit fully from the wealth of the region, and we have seen to it that it is the product of deep and extensive consultations, and that it has now moved from idea to execution. Included in that New Vision is the long-overdue environmental clean-up of the Niger Delta beginning with Ogoni-land, which we launched last year”.

The acting President made it clear that Nigeria belongs to all, adding that no one person or group of persons is more important or more entitled than the other “in this space that we all call home”.

He added, “And we have a responsibility to live in peace and harmony with one another, to seek peaceful and constitutional means of expressing our wishes and desires, and to resist all who might seek to sow confusion and hatred for their own selfish interests”.

Osinbajo sought Nigerians’ continued prayers for “the restoration to full health and strength and the safe return of our President”.