The Nigerian government has expressed satisfaction with Commonwealth’s role in supporting the fight against corruption. The Chairman Presidential Advisory Committee against Corruption, Prof. Itse Sagay, who said this in London when they visited the Commonwealth Secretariat’s headquarters, noted that the Commonwealth technical assistance to Nigeria helped in the recovery of the proceeds of crime.
He said the Commonwealth secretariat organised two conferences on Tackling Corruption Together and the international workshop on criminal justice administration to strengthen the capacity of judges to tackle systemic corruption. Prof Sagay also said “it organised a meeting of high-level stakeholders in the management of recovered stolen assets resulting in the development of a Framework for the Management of recovered stolen assets which Nigeria never had.
The Presidential committee chairman said in April 2017, another capacity-building workshop for judges led to the production of Guidance Notes for Judges and Prosecutors on the recovery of proceeds of corruption through a non-conviction route.
Professor Sagay, said, “The Secretariat helped us in the area of non-conviction based asset recovery. We were not properly trained in this area, and didn’t have the ability to recover assets without sending someone to prison, which was becoming increasingly difficult without a conviction”
“So the Secretariat organised a workshop where experts attended from all over the world and which taught us the areas, the procedures, and the avenues and ways in which asset recovery can be done without necessarily sending a person to prison,” he explained.
He also said as a result of this technical support from the commonwealth, assets recovered this year alone exceed by far the amount that the government had recovered over the past 10 years.
Prof Sagay said “this led to the setting up of a clear structure for managing the recovered stolen assets including the creation of a central recovery account, to prevent funds from being ‘re-looted’ “
The Director, Governance and Peace Directorate at the Commonwealth secretariat, Katalaina Sapolu said the measures recommended by the Commonwealth were allowed to work, which led to the successes recorded so far in the fight against corruption in Nigeria.
“I am delighted that the measures the Commonwealth Secretariat helped to set out have been implemented by the Government of Nigeria and are now bearing fruit”
She assured the Nigerian delegation that that’s why providing a framework to ensure that countries such as Nigeria can root out corruption is absolutely essential for the wellbeing and functioning of a nation.
The Executive Secretary of the Committee, Professor Bolaji Owasanoye, and new Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission, said. “All of the background work to preparing the forfeiture framework was done with the Commonwealth, so it’s been a very excellent collaboration and has resulted in some very positive results for Nigeria.”
The Commonwealth is now considering adopting similar strategy to the fight against corruption in other member nations desirous of such intervention carried out in Nigeria as a success story.
