A Non-Governmental Organization – the Muslim Media Watch Group of Nigeria, has called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) not to shield any individual or group committing financial crimes in the Country; rather it should expose them to get rid of economic problems facing the Country.
It would be recalled that the EFCC recently disclosed in Abuja during its one-day dialogue with some stakeholders that some Religious Organizations were aiding and abetting corrupt practices including money laundering. It sighted one of them for example to have kept in its Account a sum of N7 Billion looted funds – stating further that the Religious Body went to Court to request for court to prevent EFCC from verifying its Account.
In a powerful Press Statement released today by the Muslim Media Watch Group of Nigeria and signed by its National Coordinator Alhaji Ibrahim Abdullahi, the Group called on the anti-graft Agency to disclose publicly the Religious Body involved and intensify its efforts to retrieve the looted funds.
The Group commended Mr. Olukoyede, the new EFCC Chairman for being courageous in making the disclosure but implored him to go further by disclosing the identity of the Religious Body.
The Muslim Media Watch Group of Nigeria stated that it was hightime for EFCC to initiate amendments into some parts of the Nation’s Administration of Criminal Justice (ACJ) whereby not all economic crimes would be bailable because of dangers inherent in it, pointing-out that it was time for Nigeria to bench-mark bailable economic crimes in Nigeria.
The Media Group also called for abolition of Plea Bargaining in our legal system stating further that its provision in our laws have been encouraging economic crimes since offenders are made to refund only certain percentage of looted funds to get cases against them terminated.
HIGH COST OF FOOD PRICES
On high cost of food prices, the Media Group implored President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to sit all the State Governors and the Minister of FCT down and plan successfully food distribution process that would crash the prices down; stating that the gains of subsidy removal could be ploughed into food and transportation subsidy to reduce hardship facing the Nation instead of sharing the money to states at FAAC Meetings.
The Group lamented that money shared monthly to Governors are not being felt at the grassroot as suffering of the masses have continued unabated.
The Group maintained that Food items could be subsidised by Government if they are sold to public servants and pensioners monthly through various Government Establishments.
MMWG lamented the hunger biting hard on Nigerians and called on the Federal Government to set up Task Force on Commodities Distribution with involvement of military personnel to control prices of food items to ease the current hardship….END.