Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, has pegged total recoveries from dubious funds stashed away from local and foreign sources at $1 billion.
The minister said the amounts were recovered between 2015 and 2022 from corrupt Nigerians.
The minister stated this while briefing State House correspondents after the meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC), presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the State House, Abuja.
Malami, who stated that the Ministry of Justice presented a new Anti-Corruption Strategy Document (2022 to 2026), said the FEC approved the new document aimed at strengthening the anti-corruption war of the Federal Government.
He disclosed that the Federal Government had recorded only 109 convictions before 2015, while the Buhari administration convicted over 3,000 offenders and recovered about $1 billion to date.
“FEC approved validation extension of the National Anti-Corruption Programme to 2026”, he said.
He noted that the previous anti-corruption initiatives had helped the government to recover about $1 billion stolen funds from the public coffers, adding that “the new anti-corruption strategy will strengthen the war against corruption between 2022 and 2026”.
Malami, while responding to question on budget padding, expressed disappointments with ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) engaged in budget padding.
Malami’s position is coming on the heels of several revelations from the ongoing MDAs budget defence at the National Assembly.
It would be recalled that the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management, and Social Development, Sadiya Umar Farouq, had blamed the Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed, for adding N206 billion to the humanitarian ministry’s budget.
Farouq, who appeared before the Senate Committee on Special Duties on Monday to defend the 2023 budget, claimed that the ministry requested some projects for the North-East Development Commission and the National Social Safety Net Project in the 2022 budget, which were not released, but was surprised to see an inflated amount in the 2023 budget of the ministry.
Malami, who was responding to questions on the revelations about budget padding coming out from the National Assembly, stated that the Federal Government is studying the revelations and will do what is necessary to address it.
“Whichever way one looks at it, budget padding is bad, because if you budget N5 billion for road and N3 billion of that fund is diverted, it means the government has lost that money and it will take a longer period to complete the project.
“The government is concerned and will do what is necessary to address the issue”.
Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, revealed that FEC approved a budget augmentation of N14 billion on the Kano Western bypass, awarded to Dantata and Sawo.
The road project was raised from N22 billion to N36.89 billion.
“The need to include a flyover and more hydronic facilities to drain water, necessitated the augmentation”, he said, adding that “this will link the Kano-Maiduguri highway.”
The Council also approved a note on the Enugu to Port Harcourt Road, 56 kilometers, adding that “there were delays on the trailer parks and litigation from communities whose lands were affected by the road project”.
FEC also approved a review of the national anti-corruption policy of the Federal Government, extending it from the year 2022 to 2026.
The review and extension, according to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, became necessary, following successes recorded by the administration in its anti-corruption drive.
Malami revealed that the anti-corruption agencies have been able to secure convictions on behalf of the government in courts to the tune of over 3000.
“The first $322 million recovered by the administration was exclusively deployed for social intervention programmes like Npower, market money, school feeding programmes, among others.
“We think the anti-corruption policy of the Muhammadu Buhari administration has been largely successful because we have secured over 3000 convictions as at the year 2022. From 109 convictions we have gotten over 3000 convictions which is the major reason we decided to extend the policy from 2022 to 2026,” he stated.
Culled from Independent
