EFCC vs GYB - What A Show of Shame By An Anti-graft Agency »

By: Jesutega Onokpasa

I cannot believe what I heard from the spokesman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, this morning on Arise TV.

According to him, amongst other things, apparently including parking at the carpark of the commission’s headquarters (as if visitors to the their headquarters should park on top of the building, itself) Governor Usman Ododo of Kogi State, breached protocol by insisting on seeing EFCC Chairman, Barrister Olanipekun Olukoyede, for the purpose of handing over former Governor Yahaya Bello.

What a cock and bull story and pitiable kindergarten excuse for their gross incompetence and obvious ulterior motive?

Why would Ododo not insist on seeing Olukoyede?

Who the hell does Olukoyede think he is that even I, as a private citizen, cannot insist on seeing him, not to talk of the Governor of a federating unit of our country?

Who was Governor Ododo then supposed to handover the person they, themselves, had declared wanted to?

A sitting Governor brought someone you claimed to be a suspect and had declared wanted to your headquarters and he should simply had handed him over to the gateman to be butchered or what?

How do you handover a suspect under the law?

Is there not supposed to be some form of documentation showing that I have handed over the suspect to you and he is safe in your custody?

After all, he is presumed innocent till proven guilty.

Supposed, God forbid, something happened to him if I just carelessly handed him over to armed men at the gate and drove off without knowing who to hold responsible, will is family, friends and supporters not come after me that I betrayed him into the hands of his enemies?

The EFCC spokesman said it was because Ododo is a Governor that their men at the gate granted him ingress into the headquarters – what an insult!

You can imagine how these people reason and how disgracefully megalomanic they have become..

This is the real problem with the EFCC – they believe we should all cower in fear once we hear “EFCC is coming”.

Well, EFCC my foot!

The EFCC headquarters is a public facility and, under the law, absolutely anybody can go there as long as they have reasonable cause to be there.

What can be more reasonable than bringing someone you had declared wanted to your national headquarters?

I, myself, drove to their headquarters immediately I was informed former Governor Bello and Governor Ododo were there because I have always been highly suspicious of the true intent of the EFCC with respect to Yahaya Bello.

How did I gain access to the premises: did I “jump the fence” or drive in through the front gate like every other law-abiding citizen?

And, where did I park other than in the same carpark where the EFCC is insisting a Governor cannot park?

And, how could it possibly be a breach of protocol even if Yahaya Bello had invited the entire world media from the BBC to Fox News and CNN to cover his reporting at the headquarters of a total disgrace of an agency that had declared him wanted?

Are they not the ones who subjected him to media trial, in the first place?

Have they forgotten when their Chairman was running his mouth at press conferences, litigating a case he had filed in court before the court of public opinion, when, as a lawyer, he should know better?

Is there any law against reporting at a police station or other law enforcement facility and ensuring everyone knows you have done so?

Oh, Yahaya should have simply gone there quietly without telling anyone so those after him might had taken the opportunity to assassinate him and pretend he was never at the premises?

I have never heard such utter rubbish as the snake oil salesman narrative the EFCC is spewing and it is now crystal clear that by boldly showing up at EFCC headquarters like a true law-abiding citizen, former Governor Yahaya Bello has never been hiding from the law and has never been a fugitive from justice.

On the contrary, Yahaya Bello has all along only been taking precautions to prevent godless men from eliminating him under the guise of fighting corruption when they are actually the most corrupt people in the entire country.

We all have a right to self-preservation as well as self-defence under the law.

All Yahaya Bello has been doing thus far is self-preservation, his innate and inalienable God given fundamental human right under natural law.

Former Governor Bello should be admired and commended for towing the path of peace and reconciliation by sticking to self-preservation rather than opting for self-defence.

As for the EFCC, its Chairman, Olukoyede, must be sacked and the agency must be seriously probed, if not for that entirely pathetic excuse for an anti-graft agency, which is by far the most corrupt agency in the Federal Republic of Nigeria, to be totally scrapped.

Onokpasa, a lawyer, writes from Abuja.